books/keyboard
1
0
Fork 0
Code Issues Pull requests Projects Releases Packages Wiki Activity Actions
Debian keyboard setup https://spacecruft.org/books/keyboard
22 commits 1 branch 5 tags 45 KiB
Find a file
Exact
Jeff Moe 335183d130 Update year
2026-06-09 11:11:37 -06:00
.gitignore git ignores 2025-07-16 13:25:28 -06:00
CC-1.0-Universal.txt CC0 1.0 Universal 2025-07-16 13:25:39 -06:00
CHANGELOG.txt v0.7.0 2025-07-16 14:15:32 -06:00
dot-XCompose Add ~/.XCompose as dot-XCompose 2025-07-16 13:31:18 -06:00
keyboard rm comments 2025-07-16 14:14:52 -06:00
README.md Update year 2026-06-09 11:11:37 -06:00

README.md

Keyboard

Debian GNU/Linux US keyboard setup to do accents, etc.

Files

Add these files to the system.

/etc/default/keyboard

XKBMODEL="pc105"
XKBLAYOUT="us"
XKBVARIANT=""
XKBOPTIONS="compose:menu"
BACKSPACE="guess"

That will use the menu key as the compose key. If you don't have that key, then you can use something else, such as the right Alt key, by changing the above to:

XKBOPTIONS="compose:ralt"

Other options include: compose:rctrl, compose:sclk, compose:caps.

After changing that file, run:

sudo udevadm trigger --subsystem-match=input --action=change

~/.XCompose

The q̃ letter requires another file to be set up, since it isn't a Unicode character, but uses a combining tilde.

include "%L"
<Multi_key> <asciitilde> <q> : "q̃"

Restart X after adding this file.

Characters

Examples of various characters.

Letters

Other have marks following the pattern of a, including upper case.

  • á -- <menu> + ' + a
  • à -- <menu> + ` + a
  • å -- <menu> + o + a
  • â -- <menu> + ^ + a
  • ã -- <menu> + ~ + a
  • ä -- <menu> + " + a
  • ç -- <menu> + , + c
  • ñ -- <menu> + ~ + n
  • ö -- <menu> + " + o
  • ø -- <menu> + o + /

Needs ~/.Xcompose set up:

  • q̃ -- <menu> + ~ + q

Archaic forms

  • ſ -- <menu> + f + s
  • Þ -- <menu> + T + H
  • þ -- <menu> + t + h
  • Ȝ -- CTRL-SHIFT with u + 021c + <ENTER>
  • ȝ -- CTRL-SHIFT with u + 021d + <ENTER>

Symbols

  • © -- <menu> + o + c
  • ® -- <menu> + o + r
  • ™ -- <menu> + t + m
  • · -- <menu> + . + -
  • • -- <menu> + . + =
  • ¶ -- <menu> + p + !
  • § -- <menu> + s + o
  • ± -- <menu> + + + -
  • ° -- <menu> + o + o
  • € -- <menu> + c + =
  • ¢ -- <menu> + c + /
  • £ -- <menu> + l + -
  • ¥ -- <menu> + y + =
  • ÷ -- <menu> + - + :
  • ← -- <menu> + < + -
  • → -- <menu> + - + >
  • ≠ -- <menu> + / + =
  • ∅ (empty set) -- <menu> + { + }

Punctuation

  • … -- <menu> + . + .
  • ¡ -- <menu> + ! + !
  • ¿ -- <menu> + ? + ?
  • « -- <menu> + < + <
  • » -- <menu> + > + >
  • ‘ -- <menu> + < + '
  • ’ -- <menu> + > + '
  • “ -- <menu> + < + "
  • ” -- <menu> + > + "
  • – (en dash) -- <menu> + - + - + .
  • — (em dash) -- <menu> + - + - + -

Ligatures

  • æ -- <menu> + a + e
  • œ -- <menu> + o + e
  • ff -- <menu> + f + f
  • fi -- <menu> + f + i
  • fl -- <menu> + f + l

Reference

Unicode input

To input any arbitrary Unicode character:

  • CTRL-SHIFT with u + <Unicode Hex value> + <ENTER>

To do it with a combining tilde, such as for q̃:

  • CTRL-SHIFT with u + 0303 + <ENTER> + q

  • ✝ -- CTRL-SHIFT with u + 271d + <ENTER>

  • † -- CTRL-SHIFT with u + 2020 + <ENTER> -- you probably want this one.

Chinese

There are different implementations of Chinese, depending on what you want. One is Chinese characters, the other is pinyin. Either one or the other or both can be added.

Chinese Characters

There are a lot of implementations for this. Here is an easy way. Note: I'm using Openbox with an auto-login that runs startx, so this may not be the most common way to set this up...

Install dependencies:

sudo apt install --no-install-recommends fcitx5 fcitx5-chinese-addons \
  fcitx5-config-qt fcitx5-frontend-gtk3 fcitx5-frontend-gtk4 \
  fcitx5-frontend-qt5 fonts-noto-cjk fonts-noto-color-emoji \
  fonts-symbola fcitx5-table-emoji

Edit: ~/.xsessionrc, adding:

export GTK_IM_MODULE=fcitx
export QT_IM_MODULE=fcitx
export XMODIFIERS=@im=fcitx
export SDL_IM_MODULE=fcitx
export GLFW_IM_MODULE=ibus

Edit: ~/.config/openbox/autostart, adding:

fcitx5 -d &

Reboot (or restart Openbox) and then run this: fcitx5-configtool.

In the right hand side of the window, select Pinyin. Then hit Apply and Close.

To use it hit CTRL-SPACE to toggle between English and Chinese characters. Start typing in pinyin and it will display a Chinese character to add.

Pinyin

Edit ~/.XCompose, adding:

# ---- Pinyin tone marks: Multi_key <tone-number> <vowel> ----
# Tone 1: macron (ˉ)
<Multi_key> <1> <a> : "ā"
<Multi_key> <1> <e> : "ē"
<Multi_key> <1> <i> : "ī"
<Multi_key> <1> <o> : "ō"
<Multi_key> <1> <u> : "ū"
<Multi_key> <1> <v> : "ǖ"
<Multi_key> <1> <udiaeresis> : "ǖ"

# Tone 2: acute (ˊ)
<Multi_key> <2> <a> : "á"
<Multi_key> <2> <e> : "é"
<Multi_key> <2> <i> : "í"
<Multi_key> <2> <o> : "ó"
<Multi_key> <2> <u> : "ú"
<Multi_key> <2> <v> : "ǘ"
<Multi_key> <2> <udiaeresis> : "ǘ"

# Tone 3: caron (ˇ)
<Multi_key> <3> <a> : "ǎ"
<Multi_key> <3> <e> : "ě"
<Multi_key> <3> <i> : "ǐ"
<Multi_key> <3> <o> : "ǒ"
<Multi_key> <3> <u> : "ǔ"
<Multi_key> <3> <v> : "ǚ"
<Multi_key> <3> <udiaeresis> : "ǚ"

# Tone 4: grave (ˋ)
<Multi_key> <4> <a> : "à"
<Multi_key> <4> <e> : "è"
<Multi_key> <4> <i> : "ì"
<Multi_key> <4> <o> : "ò"
<Multi_key> <4> <u> : "ù"
<Multi_key> <4> <v> : "ǜ"
<Multi_key> <4> <udiaeresis> : "ǜ"

# Toneless ü (neutral tone): Multi_key v u  ->  ü
<Multi_key> <v> <u> : "ü"
<Multi_key> <u> <udiaeresis> : "ü"

/etc/default/keyboard must be set up as shown above.

Then reboot, or restart Openbox.

To type pinyin characters, do, for example:

  • ē -- <menu> + 1 + e
  • é -- <menu> + 2 + e
  • ě -- <menu> + 3 + e
  • è -- <menu> + 4 + e

Where <menu> is your compose key (could be right Alt, not Menu, for example, depending how you set up /etc/default/keyboard).

License

This is placed in the public domain.

CC0 1.0 Universal

2025, 2026 Jeff Moe