Enable SCIM render deadkeys useless in KDE/Qt apps

[cablop]

Binary package hint: scim

Background
=========

I saw similar bugs, they talk about problems in KDE session or in old versions of Ubuntu.

This one is about
    - running KDE programs under Gnome session
    - with SCIM enabled for complex character entry
    - in non asian locale
    - in the last Gutsy version

I was using Feisty and Feisty works well, but Gutsy not, this is a lot of backward steps.

The Problem
=========

The problem is:

I installed asian language support for Chinese and Japanese. Then marked the field "Enable support to enter complex characters".
Then restarted the machine and tried to write Chinese and Japanese. The first issues was we're unable to use SCIM, and unable to write accents, cause dead keys are broken. It means you press the accent key like ~ and then the vowel a expecting ã as a result but getting ~a instead. OK, I started to read about a solution and found we must change:

GTK_IM_MODULE=xim
QT_IM_MODULE=xim

for

GTK_IM_MODULE="scim-bridge"
QT_IM_MODULE="scim-bridge"

Of course I installed scim-bridge-client-qt and scim-bridge-client-gtk.

But the solution just worked for Gnome applications. Now i can write chinese and accents in gnome apps like gedit. In KDE applications the problem persists, it does not recognize dead keys, and I can just write english and chinese, but not spanish or portuguese in KDE apps. That turn those applications useless for productive work.

[Ming Hua (minghua)]

The "deadkeys not working with SCIM" is a well-known bug, and have been somehow mitigated in gutsy by the change of /FrontEnd/X11/Dynamic setting.

Your problem is the result of multiple bugs, including language-selector's configurations for input methods, scim's im-switch setting (I suspect that's the reason your system worked for feisty but not for gutsy, if you used your old $HOME from feisty), as well as scim and scim-bridge. To be honest, I don't think it's wise to associate this bug to multiple packages, but I'm not going to change that.

[Ming Hua (minghua)]

Also note the scim part of the bug is duplicate of bug #77168.

[cablop (cablop)]

Um, I saw this report, but i don't know if it is useful or not to solve the problem:

Some points:

I'm not using an old Feisty folder, I did a new Gutsy installation. Then the problem appeared.

You said there's a solution in /FrontEnd/X11/Dynamic. I want to see this solution, please give me a link to solve it.
As far as I know, this solution enables again the deadkeys but diable SCIM for KDE apps; and some users, like me, need both entries, accents and chinese.
Thanks if you can give me a link to this solution.

I placed the bug in some groups, cause i don't know if it's a problem of SCIM or a problem of QT libraries or a problem of new SCIM-bridge package. Maybe the problem is in the scim-bridge-client-qt but there's no package here to add the bug.

[cablop (cablop)]

I toke a look at /FrontEnd/X11/Dynamic setting. New points in this bug report:

 - I have a fresh Gutsy installation (NOT an upgrade), installed totally from scratch. So the value of this setting was for default, as you said, false. But dead key's are disabled.
 - I forgot to mention the problem specifically related to Gutsy, not with all distros.
 - They worked before enabling SCIM chinese and japanese input. after enabling it SCIM was useless.
 - I changed xim for scim-bridge. This just solved the problem for GTK, not for QT.

[cablop (cablop)]

I also posted this in a different bug report (https://bugs.launchpad.net/debian/+source/scim/+bug/77168):

I got a "stupid" way to "solve" the deadkeys problem in Gutsy for KDE apps...

What I did:
0.- I reinstalled Gutsy, all from scratch, and using an Ubuntu Studio version instead the original version. *
1.- I added the Ubuntu DVD as a repository source and then added the other repositories. I'm not using gutsy-updates nor gutsy-security. **
2.- I opened language settings and installed Chinese and Japanese support. ***
3.- Restarted the System.
4.- I opened language settings and activated complex characters input, then applied. I unchecked this option, applied again. I enabled again this setting, applied and closed the window. Reopened the window and checked the option is active. ****
5.- Restarted the system.
6.- Opened Gedit. As expected you cannot trigger SCIM with ctrl+space, but you can right click and select it to input text. With or without SCIM there's no deadkeys problem.
7.- Opened Konversation and Opera to check input. Cannot choose input but there's no dead key problem.
8.- Installed scim-qtimm. *****
9.- Installed scim-bridge-client-qt, it also installs scim-bridge-agent.
10.- Installed scim-bridge and scim-bridge-client-gtk.
11.- Restarted.
12.- sudo gedit /etc/X11/xinit/xinput.d/scim and changed GTK_IM_MODULE=xim to GTK_IM_MODULE="scim-bridge" and QT_IM_MODULE=xim to QT_IM_MODULE="scim-bridge".
13.- Restarted. #
14.- Opened Gedit and triggered SCIM. It works as expected, and there's no problem with deadkeys.
15.- Opened Konversation and Opera. Deadkeys problem started. But you can trigger SCIM. ##
16.- Started to think KDE it's no good for my computer, and decided to use just gnome apps. Then did a little modification: sudo gedit /etc/X11/xkb/symbols/es, to enable ã accent to be able to write portuguese. ###
17.- Then I just opened SCIM to configure it for Gnome. In global settings (under interface) you found a rollover to select keyboard distribution. It said Unknown, I changed it to Spanish (Spain) the keyb I use. Closed it and rememebered I just need a pinyin input (chinese) and an anthy input (japanese). Reopened and selected them. There's an additional option, others, with spanish/european and raw input. I leave spanish/european marked.
18.- Opened Opera and triggered the SCIM. then selected spanish/european, and wow! It works! Then, disabled the SCIM, deadkeys problem is back.
19.- Opened Konversation ad did the same, I can write spanish throug SCIM too. ####
20.- Remember the step number 16? Then i opened Konversation and tried to input the ~ accent modified in this keyb to write ã... And it also works! Then SCIM is using my main tables for input, and deadkeys works through SCIM.

Two more things
a.- I think this is not a "solution" or at least a clean solution cause you don't need to use an IME to write spanish. But cause it works...
b.- The downside. Before reinstalled my system I was able to input chinese in aMSN, I don't know how! And I think if I discovered I can write spanish through SCIM I was still able to write in aMSN using spanish, english and chinese... I have to look what I did before but I'm deeply afrai...

[Jonathan Thomas (echidnaman)]

Confirmed scim issue -> invalidating kdebase task.

[augustin (beginner2005)]

This issue seems to be a duplicate of:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/kdebase/+bug/69896

[jeremy-list (quick-dudley)]

https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/400471 is a related but not identical bug.

[Philipe Marcon dos Reis (phireis)]

I have the same with jaunty running kde apps in a gnome session with scim enabled.

[xteejx (xteejx)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. The issue that you reported is one that should be reproducible with the live environment of the Desktop CD of the current release - Karmic Koala. It would help us greatly if you could test with it so we can work on getting it fixed in Ubuntu. Thanks again and we appreciate your help.

[jeremy-list (quick-dudley)]

This bug is ALMOST fixed. Multikey is still ignored and only one deadkey can be used per character. Unfortunately this means anyone using Anki to learn Mandarin has to remember the unicode raw for the following characters: ǕǖǗǘǙǚǛǜ. Incidentally, I notice that these characters are no longer enterable in GTK, so I will file a bug for that too.

[jeremy-list (quick-dudley)]

I take part of that back: I'd been pressing the wrong button for the second accent when trying to type ǜ. But multikey still doesn't work.

[xteejx (xteejx)]

Thank you for updating us with this info, upgrading status to Medium. I would assume that quite a few asian language users would be affected by this in Kubuntu.

[jeremy-list (quick-dudley)]

It's now supporting multiple deadkeys, which is my principal gripe out of the way, just the multikey that's being ignored now.

[xteejx (xteejx)]

Thank you for the update. Marking this as Fix Released. Can you file the multikeys issue under a different bug report please, as it is a separate issue, and saves confusion. Thank you again for reporting this to us.