From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: George Bronnikov To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu Subject: Re: [9fans] Russian keyboard In-Reply-To: <9af3d93e90ba8c45b5dc8f1f852ee06c@plan9.escet.urjc.es> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Date: Mon, 23 Sep 2002 23:09:05 +0400 Topicbox-Message-UUID: f34306f4-eaca-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025 On Mon, 23 Sep 2002, Fco.J.Ballesteros wrote: > : sent to /dev/kbmap)? What are the disadvantages of such a > scheme > : compared to compiled-in maps? > A compiled map can be activated even before you get the > connection to the file system. That's useful, since usually > people have to type weird characters to choose their boot file > system (if other than default). Now I see. It turns out the typical Spanish usage differs from the typical Russian usage. Spanish keyboard contains mostly the same characters as US, only in different order; thus it matters which layout you have when you type something at boot time (those are mostly Latin letters, I reckon). A Russian user, on the other hand, uses both the standard US layout and his own, and does not need Russian keyboard until the system is up and running. On the other hand, /dev/kbmap is crucial from my point of view: it means I can tune the environment even if I don't wholly control it. When I was in America, I had to configure an X terminal at the university in order to type emails home; with your default setup of a Plan 9 terminal that would mean recompiling the kernel, which is IMO an overkill for such a minor task. Goga