| 2013-09-21 18:35:19 |
George Macris |
description |
For the last several versions of Ubuntu, there was an inability to type Greek (or many non-latin scripts) in the Dash.
With bug https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity/+bug/1205713 the problem has been fixed, and it got fixed by enabling IBus for Greek, Russian and several other scripts.
However, this change revealed several deficiencies in IBus (tested with Greek and Russian):
1. It is no longer possible to use keyboard accelerators when the active keyboard layout is in Greek, Russian, etc.
The reason is because the gtk+ IM contains special code so that Ctrl+A while in the Greek keyboard layout would still do a "Select All".
Currently in Ubuntu 13.10, when you press, for example, Ctrl+A (with Greek layout active), the app receives a Greek Alpha, which is ignored by the app.
The same goes with, for example, Alt+F, which no longer opens up the File menu.
More background about this at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=69230#c2
(FIXME: need to add link to gtk+ git with code on how they implement the solution)
2. The default keyboard shortcut to switch between keyboard layouts is Super+Space (default for IBus). Pressing the Super key ends up bringing up the HUD most of the times. I have been trying to get myself to press Super+Space more properly, but it's really difficult to get it right. I now get it right only about 30% of the times, and I need to pause when typing in order to check if I am actually writing by accident in the HUD.
I would say it is a huge usability issue that, as is, will alienate non-English users of Ubuntu.
3. It is not possible to change the shortcut to switch keyboard layouts to the traditional Alt+Shift (used by most Ubuntu-gr users).
In addition, if you manage to change the shortcut to something else, then it's impossible to change back to Super+Space. |
For the last several versions of Ubuntu, there was an inability to type Greek (or many non-latin scripts) in the Dash.
With bug https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity/+bug/1205713 the problem has been fixed, and it got fixed by enabling IBus for Greek, Russian and several other scripts.
However, this change revealed several deficiencies in IBus (tested with Greek and Russian):
1. It is no longer possible to use keyboard accelerators when the active keyboard layout is in Greek, Russian, etc.
The reason is because the gtk+ IM contains special code so that Ctrl+A while in the Greek keyboard layout would still do a "Select All".
Currently in Ubuntu 13.10, when you press, for example, Ctrl+A (with Greek layout active), the app receives a Greek Alpha, which is ignored by the app.
The same goes with, for example, Alt+F, which no longer opens up the File menu.
More background about this at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=69230#c2
(FIXME: need to add link to gtk+ git with code on how they implement the solution)
2. The default keyboard shortcut to switch between keyboard layouts is Super+Space (default for IBus). Pressing the Super key ends up bringing up the HUD most of the times. I have been trying to get myself to press Super+Space more properly, but it's really difficult to get it right. I now get it right only about 30% of the times, and I need to pause when typing in order to check if I am actually writing by accident in the HUD.
I would say it is a huge usability issue that, as is, will alienate non-English users of Ubuntu.
3. It is not possible to change the shortcut to switch keyboard layouts to the traditional Alt+Shift (used by most Ubuntu-gr users).
In addition, if you manage to change the shortcut to something else, then it's impossible to change back to Super+Space. |
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