[smc-discuss] [x-post] Regression in gnome keyboard layout selection, all Indian xkb layouts disappeared

Nandakumar Edamana nandakumar at nandakumar.co.in
Fri Jun 30 08:16:47 PDT 2017


Hello,

I noticed it too. Today I switched over to Debian 9. Installation itself
was a tiresome job. The problem with the IM didn't surprise me as I had
read your mail before.

I found and followed this page, which says how we can turn of the new
integrated IM:

https://wiki.gnome.org/ThreePointFive/Features/IBus#How_to_use_other_IM_frameworks

I tried fcitx, and contrary to what you said, it APPEARED on the left
bottom part of the screen. IM selection was not that easy. I had to take
the whole configuration screen and push the preferred layout to the top of
the list each time I had to switch the layout (before that, I had added
Malayalam, which was already available in fcitx - I had to turn of a
checkbox though - 'Show current language only' - something like that).

This is of course irritating. But this page taught me the commands to
switch IM easily:

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Keyboard_layouts

So I wrote a shell script:


#!/bin/sh

if [ -f /tmp/ml ]; then
	setxkbmap us
	rm /tmp/ml
else
	setxkbmap in -variant mal
	cat /dev/null > /tmp/ml
fi

Then I created a shortcut for it (which was the next difficult thing since
GNOME Shell eats up all combinations). What I have now chosen is Right
Ctrl + Menu.

This is of course not a real solution. But it works for the time being.

Nandakumar Edamana


> hi,
>
> We need to fix this soon. We first noticed this in the install fest at
> Wayanad. It was so disappointing to not be able to enable Malayalam
> typing even though the requirement was just inscript :(
>
> We tried to install ibus and fcitx without success, gnome would happily
> switch the indicator but can't type anything, fcitx won't show up in the
> systray. Choosing a keyboard should not be this difficult, it never was
> before.
>
> It seems the GNOME developers (though they are certainly not an
> exception) love to rewrite from scratch and remove essential things
> (network manager, touchpad settings are other example where new versions
> break essential features present in older versions).
>
> See bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=865316 (first bug, we
> should have a better way to use ibus and fcitx too)
>
> Thanks
> Praveen
>
>
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