From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: William Gardella Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: How does the Meta/Alt-Key work behind the scenes? Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2012 12:51:53 -0400 Organization: Aioe.org NNTP Server Message-ID: <87pq3yinyu.fsf@gmail.com> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1351702521 2969 80.91.229.3 (31 Oct 2012 16:55:21 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2012 16:55:21 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Wed Oct 31 17:55:29 2012 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1TTbZf-0007sc-Pz for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Wed, 31 Oct 2012 17:55:27 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:37168 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1TTbZX-000491-6U for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Wed, 31 Oct 2012 12:55:19 -0400 Original-Received: by 10.180.97.162 with SMTP id eb2mr729336wib.0.1351702315859; Wed, 31 Oct 2012 09:51:55 -0700 (PDT) Original-Path: usenet.stanford.edu!c7no975641qap.0!news-out.google.com!ha8ni94251wib.1!nntp.google.com!feeder1.cambriumusenet.nl!feed.tweaknews.nl!138.195.8.3.MISMATCH!news.ecp.fr!aioe.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail Original-Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help Original-Lines: 36 Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: JVyhZFzbqZK20+JFqmIAXA.user.speranza.aioe.org Original-X-Complaints-To: abuse@aioe.org User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/24.2 (gnu/linux) X-Notice: Filtered by postfilter v. 0.8.2 Cancel-Lock: sha1:23AhuSsFNme9NK+qQ3PBeKQpO58= Original-Xref: usenet.stanford.edu gnu.emacs.help:195177 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:87506 Archived-At: Hi Thorsten, Thorsten Jolitz writes: > Stefan Monnier writes: > >>> However, I was told to hardcode the Meta/Alt-Keybindings as ESC-key >>> sequences, e.g. '^[', wait 500, then 'f', so that they can either be >>> used as 'ALT-f' or as 'ESC f'. But only the latter (very uncomfortable) >>> option works for me, and any keybindings that include the SHIFT key >>> don't work at all. >> >> What does "don't work" mean? > > Maybe I asked to early since further testing revealed that it is not a > general problem but a problem of some keys only: > > When I use 'C-%' (^% = C-S-5 on my keyboard) which should execute the > command 'go to next parenthesis' then in xterm '%' is (self)inserted, on > the console nothing happens. But 'C-_' (^_ = C-S-- on my keyboard) > executes 'undo' as expected in xterm and on the console. > > So I would like to withdraw my question for now - sorry for the noise. TTY keys are complicated, and really limit the ability of an application like Emacs to use its bucky bits. Some chords that are valid in a window system are not valid in a console (or in a terminal emulator under normal circumstances, which acts like a console). See e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASCII#ASCII_control_characters and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANSI_escape_code to get a feel for what is possible and what is missing. -WGG -- I use grml (http://grml.org/)