[Openmcl-devel] support for International keyboards

[Jeremy Jones]

The Clozure CL IDE doesn't work well with international keyboards
(e.g. http://trac.clozure.com/openmcl/ticket/182).  We believe that
most of these problems are caused by the way CCL processes the option
key.  Currently, the option key is used as the meta modifier for
editor commands.  Making the option key work like it does in most Mac
applications should fix most of these problems with international
keyboards.  The question then becomes, how should we indicate meta for
editor commands?  Below are some various options for dealing with
this.  Let us know which you would prefer:

1.  Keep the option key as meta except when it conflicts with commonly
used keystrokes for each locale.

This would require getting a list of common option key sequences
necessary for each locale.  It also means that the subsumed editor
commands will have different, or no keystroke equivalents.

2.  Never use the option key for anything but it's intended use on the Mac.

This has the advantage of implementation simplicity.  However, in this
case how should meta be indicated?

2a.  Meta is indicated by typing escape first.

This is simple, and is the default for some types of Emacs.

2b.  Meta is indicated by the command key.

This raises the question of what to do with conflicting menu-key equivalents.

2b1.  Make none of the menus have command key equivalents.

2b2.  Give the user the choice of what the various command/key
combinations do.  Some could be menu equivalents, and some could be
bound to editor commands.

This is flexible, but it might be confusing and difficult to manage.


2a is the simplest, complete solution.  2b1 is also simple and
complete.  We could certainly make user preferences for some of these
options.  Are there any other ideas?  Which choices would people
prefer?

Thanks,

Jeremy