no swiss french kbd layout!

[aleph]

I do not know if this is the "official kubuntu forum" Anyway, I submit my problem here.
I downloaded the Kubuntu 5.10 live-cd this morning. I was really disappointed. There is no layout for my and the Swiss French keyboard! (System setting).
For the while, I do not want to enter into to much details. I'm only interested in knowing if the Kubuntu team is aware of this.

[Patrick]

Re: no swiss french kbd layout!

This is the official forum.

I found Swiss in Keyboard layouts.
Do the following:

Open System Settings.

Go to Region & Accessibility

Keyboard Layout

Under available layouts there should be Switzerland (ch)

Select it and press the "add >>" button

~ Patrick

[aleph]

Re: no swiss french kbd layout!

You gave me the answer I expected.
Without being a Linux guru, I think (+/-) I have a small idea about the issue. Unfortunatelly, this is more complicate than this. In Switzerland, there are two keyboard layouts in use. One for the French speaking people, one for the German speaking people. They are called Swiss French and Swiss German layouts. The problem in Kubuntu is, there is no way to differentiate them. I do not know the correct spelling of the key mapping files, the French one should countain something like "fr_CH" its name and the German one should have something like "de_CH".
Selecting the kbd layout from Sytem Settings corresponds to this command:
setxkbmap -model pc104 -layout ch -variant basic.

If the layout selector is working correctly, I should get something like this for the Swiss Frech keyboard:
setxkbmap -model pc104 -layout fr_CH -variant basic
and for the Swiss German kyb
setxkbmap -model pc104 -layout de_CH -variant basic.

All this on X, of course.

I have the feeling, there is only one "Swiss keyboard mapping file" for Switzerland or there is some other missmatch.

[Patrick]

Re: no swiss french kbd layout!

You could try to edit you /etc/X11/xorg.conf file and look for this bit:

Section "InputDevice"
	Identifier	"Generic Keyboard"
	Driver		"kbd"
	Option		"CoreKeyboard"
	Option		"XkbRules"	"xorg"
	Option		"XkbModel"	"pc105"
	Option		"XkbLayout"	"gb"
EndSection

And try changing the gb to de_ch. Not sure if that will work tho...

[aleph]

Re: no swiss french kbd layout!

Thanks for the quick reply, I saw the xorg.conf file modification on other forums with miscellaneous successes.

This will not work for some other reasons:
- I can change this in the live cd.
- It should work from the System Settings. Some family members prefer the Swiss French layout and some othe the Swiss German layout. You know, when you can blindly type with your ten fingers...

This is a real issue, I will not install Kubuntu on my spare machine, if this is not working.
Since this is the official Kubuntu forum, is there any hope this will be fixed soon? Or should I wait six months for the next release?

Tip: try and check one another KDE based distro like SimplyMepis, you will see, there is a choice between fr_CH and de_CH.

Sorry, I'm really stuck by what I call a stupid problem.

[aleph]

Re: no swiss french kbd layout!

Well, I do not know how I should start this reply. I have problem with my Swiss French keyboard, I was intrigated about this. I decided to take a closer look and I compared Kubuntu 5.10 with some other live cds, I have, slax 5.0.6 and SimplyMepis 2004.2, both kde based distributions. My research was fructuous.
It happens Kubuntu is not using the same engine/software/keys mapping files than other kde based distros. Where is this coming from? Is this a new xorg variant? I really do not know.
The only thing I can say, it that the /etc/X11/xkb/* dir are different.
On Kubuntu, the fr_CH and de_CH mapping files are no more existing. I understand, they are replaced by some objective c files, which are supposed to do the remapping. The problem I see is that these remapping files are not doing their jobs correctly. It seems they are no "tuned" correctly. In my case, there are no different files for the Swiss French or the Swiss German keyboards, but only a swiss file, which is wrong.
Interestingly, the same kind of issue should happen with some other "countries" using different kbd, eg Gerorgia, there is no way to differentiate the Georgian Latin kbd and the Georgin Cyrillic kbds, the ge_la and ge_ru files.
Regards.

[aleph]

Re: no swiss french kbd layout!

Hi everybody,

I spend a lot of time on the French (K)ubuntu list. Good news,
the Swiss French and Swiss German keyboard layouts are perfectly working. It is possible to setup the layout through the UI or through the command line with a setxkbmap command.

The problem comes or came fron the newest X.Org version. It has introduced quite a lot of misunderstanding.

In order to setup a Swiss French kbd layout, you should
1) select the country, (ch) in my case
2) select the "fr" variant in the layout variant.

For a Swiss German kbd layout, the point 2) reduces to selecting the "de" variant.

These changes seem to be correctly applied to the conf file.
One gets
Option "XkbLayout" "ch"
Option "XkbVariant" "fr" or "de"

The tricky part was really to understand that for one "country remapping file", ch in my case, all "keyboard variations" of that kbd are included in the ch file. In my case, the fr_CH and de_CH from other distros or Kunbutu versions <5.10 are no more necesary and therefore not part of the distro.

One another example, the Georgian kbd layouts
1) Select the country Georgia
2) Select the kbd variant, la for a latin kbd or ru for a cyrillic kbd.

There is a small caveat in this new appraoch, for a given country, let say Switzerland, it is impossible to toggle between the Swiss French and Swiss German layout, without having to reconfigure the whole kbd setup.

With the hope, this helps.