Text input fields lost Emacs bindings

[Barry Warsaw]

Before today's full upgrade to 14.04, all the text input fields in the chromium browser responded to the basic Emacs navigation keys, such as ctrl-a (beginning of line), ctrl-e (end of line), ctrl-n (next line), ctrl-p (previous-line), ctrl-f (forward character), and ctrl-b (backward character). The fields these key bindings worked in include the awesome bar (i.e. url/search text field), and both single and multiline text input fields inside web pages (such as this one).

Now, none of these keybindings work this way anymore. This is a severe productivity regression.

This is despite the following facts:

% gconftool-2 --get /desktop/gnome/interface/gtk_key_theme
Emacs
% gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface gtk-key-theme
'Emacs'

and the fact that the keybindings still work in Firefox and other applications.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
Package: chromium-browser 34.0.1847.116-0ubuntu2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-24.46-generic 3.13.9
Uname: Linux 3.13.0-24-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu3
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: Unity
Date: Mon Apr 21 11:03:58 2014
Desktop-Session:
 DESKTOP_SESSION = ubuntu
 XDG_CONFIG_DIRS = /etc/xdg/xdg-ubuntu:/usr/share/upstart/xdg:/etc/xdg
 XDG_DATA_DIRS = /usr/share/ubuntu:/usr/share/gnome:/usr/local/share/:/usr/share/
EcryptfsInUse: Yes
Env:
 MOZ_PLUGIN_PATH = None
 LD_LIBRARY_PATH = None
InstallationDate: Installed on 2011-07-12 (1013 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Alpha amd64 (20110705.1)
SourcePackage: chromium-browser
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to trusty on 2011-12-23 (849 days ago)
chromium-default: CHROMIUM_FLAGS=""
gconf-keys: /desktop/gnome/applications/browser/exec = b'/usr/bin/chromium-browser\n'/desktop/gnome/url-handlers/https/command = b'/usr/bin/chromium-browser %s\n'/desktop/gnome/url-handlers/https/enabled = b'true\n'/desktop/gnome/url-handlers/http/command = b'/usr/bin/chromium-browser %s\n'/desktop/gnome/url-handlers/http/enabled = b'true\n'/desktop/gnome/session/required_components/windowmanager = b''/apps/metacity/general/compositing_manager = b''/desktop/gnome/interface/icon_theme = b'gnome\n'/desktop/gnome/interface/gtk_theme = b'Clearlooks\n'
modified.conffile..etc.default.chromium.browser: [deleted]

[Barry Warsaw (barry)]

I'm betting this is caused by the switch from Gtk+ to Aura. I guessing there's little we can do except downgrade to v33.

[Barry Warsaw (barry)]

Downgraded to 33.0.1750.152-0ubuntu0.13.10.1~pkg984.1 (the last v33 on archive.ubuntu.com) and not only are the Emacs key bindings fixed, but so are other anomalies I noticed, including funky colors in the url bar.

[Barry Warsaw (barry)]

This is still a problem on Utopic.

[Barry Warsaw (barry)]

From the upstream bug report, it looks like some workaround was added back to v35, so I'll wait until that lands in utopic (which as of this writing still has v34).

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Matt Zimmerman (mdz)]

I miss my gtk-key-theme="Emacs" too. :-(

Let me know if you discover a workaround for 14.04...

[Barry Warsaw (barry)]

Sadly the only workaround I found was to pin chromium-browser to v33. :(

I'm still waiting for v35 to show up in utopic. :(

[Barry Warsaw (barry)]

Everything is happy in Vivid: Version 41.0.2272.76 Ubuntu 15.04 (64-bit)