[gentoo-user] Installation: help me set up my keyboard, please.

[gentoo-user] Installation: help me set up my keyboard, please.

[Alan Mackenzie]

Hi, Gentoo,

I'm having a great time installing Gentoo, and everything's going
swimmingly, including having compiled a kernel, got networking working, I
can use a USB stick, .....

Except I've hit a brick wall.  I want to set up my console keyboard, so I
go to edit /etc/conf.d/keymaps, as described in the "x86 Handbook".

That file says, after a temporary previous edit:

#########################################################################
# Use KEYMAP to specify the default console keymap.  There is a complete tree
# of keymaps in /usr/share/keymaps to choose from.

KEYMAP="uk"
#########################################################################

This is aggravatingly vague.  I cannot find anything to tell me _HOW_ to
"Use KEYMAP to specify ...".  Somehow, my current setting of "uk" seems
to find and load an appropriate keymap, perhaps
/usr/share/keymaps/i386/qwerty/uk.map.gz.

So the question is how do I get the system to load up my own special
keymap, currently called boottime.keymap.gz on my Debian system?  Where
must I write this file so that it gets loaded?  Where do I find the
documentation telling where to write this file?

I've delved into /etc/init.d/keymaps (a "runscript" shell), but it
appears merely to use ${KEYMAP}.  I cannot see how this script manages to
find a filename out of "uk".  Presumably the interpreter /sbin/runscript
runs the find command, somehow.  But I can't find any documentation for
runscript.

So I'm stymied.  It's a real jar after so much of the installation has
gone so smoothly, with otherwise excellent documentation, well above
average for a Linux distro.

How do I set my keyboard layout?

Thanks in advance for the help!

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).
-- 
gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org mailing list

Re: [gentoo-user] Installation: help me set up my keyboard, please.

[Sebastian Günther]

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* Alan Mackenzie (acm@muc.de) [18.07.08 23:00]:
> Hi, Gentoo,
> 
Hi,

> I'm having a great time installing Gentoo, and everything's going
> swimmingly, including having compiled a kernel, got networking working, I
> can use a USB stick, .....
> 
fine,

> Except I've hit a brick wall.  I want to set up my console keyboard, so I
> go to edit /etc/conf.d/keymaps, as described in the "x86 Handbook".
> 
Maybe you have just what the Germans call "Ein Brett vorm Kopf"

> That file says, after a temporary previous edit:
> 
> #########################################################################
> # Use KEYMAP to specify the default console keymap.  There is a complete tree
> # of keymaps in /usr/share/keymaps to choose from.
> 
> KEYMAP="uk"
> #########################################################################
> 
> This is aggravatingly vague.  I cannot find anything to tell me _HOW_ to
> "Use KEYMAP to specify ...".  Somehow, my current setting of "uk" seems
> to find and load an appropriate keymap, perhaps
> /usr/share/keymaps/i386/qwerty/uk.map.gz.
> 
KEYMAP is just a env var which holds the arguments for loadkeys. And for 
sure it finds this keymap. And this is by far not vague. See below.

If you need uk keyboard layout: your done :-)

> So the question is how do I get the system to load up my own special
> keymap, currently called boottime.keymap.gz on my Debian system?  Where
> must I write this file so that it gets loaded?  Where do I find the
> documentation telling where to write this file?
> 
> I've delved into /etc/init.d/keymaps (a "runscript" shell), but it
> appears merely to use ${KEYMAP}.  I cannot see how this script manages to
> find a filename out of "uk".  Presumably the interpreter /sbin/runscript
> runs the find command, somehow.  But I can't find any documentation for
> runscript.
> 

Keymaps are loaded with loadkeys. man loadkeys gives the glory details.
(there is also a hint how to set this as kernel keymap ;-))

It searches in /usr/share/keymaps for the string.

As you may have noticed all keymaps differ before the .map.gz. So it 
should go smoothly, if you put your keymap in any folder, an appropiate 
for sanity, and rename it to something unique, a la my-own-nifty.map.gz. 

Test it with 
# loadkeys my-own-nifty 

> So I'm stymied.  It's a real jar after so much of the installation has
> gone so smoothly, with otherwise excellent documentation, well above
> average for a Linux distro.
> 
> How do I set my keyboard layout?
> 

loadkeys

> Thanks in advance for the help!
> 
HTH

Sebastian

-- 
 " Religion ist das Opium des Volkes. "      Karl Marx

 SEB@STI@N GÜNTHER         mailto:samson@guenther-roetgen.de

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Re: [gentoo-user] Installation: help me set up my keyboard, please.

[Alan Mackenzie]

Hi, Sebastian!

On Fri, Jul 18, 2008 at 11:39:32PM +0200, Sebastian Günther wrote:
> * Alan Mackenzie (acm@muc.de) [18.07.08 23:00]:

[ .... ]

> > Except I've hit a brick wall.  I want to set up my console keyboard,
> > so I go to edit /etc/conf.d/keymaps, as described in the "x86
> > Handbook".

> Maybe you have just what the Germans call "Ein Brett vorm Kopf"

Hah!  That reminds me of a Monty Python sketch involving monks.  :-)

> > #########################################################################
> > # Use KEYMAP to specify the default console keymap.  There is a complete tree
> > # of keymaps in /usr/share/keymaps to choose from.

> > KEYMAP="uk"
> > #########################################################################

> > This is aggravatingly vague.  I cannot find anything to tell me _HOW_ to
> > "Use KEYMAP to specify ...".  Somehow, my current setting of "uk" seems
> > to find and load an appropriate keymap, perhaps
> > /usr/share/keymaps/i386/qwerty/uk.map.gz.

> KEYMAP is just a env var which holds the arguments for loadkeys. And for 
> sure it finds this keymap. And this is by far not vague. See below.

> > So the question is how do I get the system to load up my own special
> > keymap, currently called boottime.keymap.gz on my Debian system?
> > Where must I write this file so that it gets loaded?  Where do I find
> > the documentation telling where to write this file?

> > I've delved into /etc/init.d/keymaps (a "runscript" shell), but it
> > appears merely to use ${KEYMAP}.  I cannot see how this script manages to
> > find a filename out of "uk".  Presumably the interpreter /sbin/runscript
> > runs the find command, somehow.  But I can't find any documentation for
> > runscript.

> Keymaps are loaded with loadkeys. man loadkeys gives the glory details.
> (there is also a hint how to set this as kernel keymap ;-))

Ah, loadkeys, my old friend!  I confess I'd not looked at man loadkeys
for around 5 years.  It's changed.

> It searches in /usr/share/keymaps for the string.

Ah!  I've not seen this in *nix before, giving a filename fragment and
having the system DWIM.  I'm not sure I like it.

> As you may have noticed all keymaps differ before the .map.gz. So it
> should go smoothly, if you put your keymap in any folder, an appropiate
> for sanity, and rename it to something unique, a la
> my-own-nifty.map.gz. 

> Test it with 
> # loadkeys my-own-nifty 

Yes, it works.  I should have just tried it.  

> > How do I set my keyboard layout?

> loadkeys

Thanks!  It now works.

> Sebastian

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).
-- 
gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org mailing list

Re: [gentoo-user] Installation: help me set up my keyboard, please.

[Iain Buchanan]

On Fri, 2008-07-18 at 23:39 +0200, Sebastian Günther wrote:

> Maybe you have just what the Germans call "Ein Brett vorm Kopf"

Brett is a worm head?  What have you got against Brett?

;)
-- 
Iain Buchanan <iaindb at netspace dot net dot au>

What is the robbing of a bank compared to the founding of a bank?
		-- Bertold Brecht