A basic question about keyboards

[roger64]

Hi

I have been sometimes advised by very knowledgeable people to build my EPUB from scratch using Sigil. The resulting code would probably be cleaner, and after some learning difficulties, I would probably get better results. This advice is probably right but...

For this I would probably have to drop the French language. With Sigil, I can import, edit, even check a French text very easily and conveniently. But there is a stumbling block: I can't write easily in French because I cannot use fully with Sigil the keyboard I use everyday. I cannot even accent a common letter like ô without resorting to "insert a special character".

With the discussion about named entities and html5 raging and flaming, what if Sigil tried to help users discard as many "named entities" as they can and helped them plainly type instead directly the character... Most would gladly do it if they could do it 100% with their chosen and proven keyboard.

So, this is surely a naive question: what prevents Sigil to let users use 100% their own keyboard
- in code view?
- in book view?

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by roger64

For this I would probably have to drop the French language. With Sigil, I can import, edit, even check a French text very easily and conveniently. But there is a stumbling block: I can't write easily in French because I cannot use fully with Sigil the keyboard I use everyday. I cannot even accent a common letter like ô without resorting to "insert a special character".

This is most likely a Linux/OSX build issue, because on Windows machines, Sigil supports whatever system keyboard was selected.
I can easily type German umlauts and even Arabic text in Book and Code View modes in Sigil 0.7.3, which is based on Qt 5.1.0.
(The only limitation I've encountered so far, is Arabic text with diacritics, which is displayed fine in Book View, but disjointed in Code View.)

Maybe something went wrong with your build and some libraries weren't included?

[roger64]

@Doitsu

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, I use an "unofficial" Linux build which up to now seemed to work nicely.

This (not being able to type directly a ô) began with the 0.7 sery of Sigil, based on Qt5. I'll have to address your remark to DiapDealer who kindly presented me with some debs and avoided me the major hassle of having to compile.

[DiapDealer]

I don't HAVE a keyboard with a different physical layout to fully test things out with ... but when I change my keyboard layout to French (or French (alternative)) in Ubuntu's system settings, my standard keyboard is able to type many characters with various diacritical marks directly into Sigil: including the ô character.

So far as I can tell. the custom-built Sigil that I packaged up for everyone seems to be supporting non-US keyboard layouts like it's supposed to.

I'm not 100% certain, of course, since more and more aspects of Qt5 OS integration seems to be being farmed out to plugins with each new release. For instance: with Qt 5.1, I had to include the new platformthemes plugin (which didn't exist separately in 5.0.x) in order for the various file-type icons to be displayed within Sigil's Book Browser on Linux.

[roger64]

Thanks for your replies which proved to be very useful - for me.

So, Sigil has nothing to do with this and I am happy to get this confirmation. DiapDealer's build is faultless about French keyboard(and other points).
So, I must now squarely (better roundly) face my belly button.

After a second examination (better now than never) I came to realize that I have with Sigil a -slightly- different French keyboard version of the one I use everyday (clavier alternatif français) on my Linux. There is of course a general agreement on most of the keys but also some differences, among them this elusive ô.

With the Sigil keyboard I type directly ô using together alt+P (just found!!...)
With my regular keyboard, I must type two keys, the acccent first, then the letter.

There are like that some devious differences that it would be tedious to point here which I did not understand until now and that I will begin to learn.

[theducks]

roger64

Ubuntu has an installed 'Diagnostic/Compatibility' tool that includes a keyboard support test.

'System Testing' is what it is labeled in the USA and it is found by searching 'More applications' (did I mention how I hate the new applications interface that does not have a simple menu)

[roger64]

Thanks for your help

Well, on a third (!) examination, this is exactly my keyboard display (information coming from Debian tool). It gives in fact two different ways to type this damned ô as I wrote upper there.

The problem is that, using Sigil and only for Sigil, the highlighted touch (see red arrow) is totally dead: no way to type l'accent circonflexe or le tréma this way. As I never used other way to type them, I was at a loss and made do inserting them as special characters.

The reason for this is unknown. Well, sorry for giving all this trouble.

[theducks]

No problem.
I just got to see an alternate (French) keyboard setup screen.
I have the basic USA english one, so that is all I ever see.

[DiapDealer]

Just so you know: when I did my testing, the key you highlighted in your layout is what I used to create the ô character in Sigil: the accent first, then the letter ('French Alternative' keyboard layout).

In other words, it seems to be working for me the way you're expecting it to work for you--based on your previous post:

With the Sigil keyboard I type directly ô using together alt+P (just found!!...)
With my regular keyboard, I must type two keys, the acccent first, then the letter.

EDIT: the above seems to work for me on older versions of Linux Mint. On newer versions of Linux Mint, I experience the same issue as you: the accent key just doesn't work as expected (no matter which French keyboard layout I choose) in Sigil. It seems dead. But it works as expected in other apps. I'll have to do some more experimenting. The good news is ... it's not just you!

[DiapDealer]

And yes... this issue is looking more and more like there's a missing Qt plugin lib from my binary package that's the culprit here.

Roger, if you'd like to test if the following unofficial binary Sigil package solves your keyboard issue, I'd appreciate it (I believe you were using the 64-bit version?).

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B5Cp...it?usp=sharing

Let me know if it resolves the problem and I'll get the 32-bit version uploaded and edit my Unofficial Linux Sigil thread.

[exaltedwombat]

Originally Posted by roger64

I use an "unofficial" Linux build which up to now seemed to work nicely.

Probably no point but:

To be blunt - do you want to make eBooks, or do you want to play with Linux?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by exaltedwombat

Probably no point but:

To be blunt - do you want to make eBooks, or do you want to play with Linux?

There's no reason to go there at all. I suggest you do everyone a favor and don't.

[exaltedwombat]

Keep off religion you mean? Yes, you're probably right :-)

[roger64]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

And yes... this issue is looking more and more like there's a missing Qt plugin lib from my binary package that's the culprit here.

Roger, if you'd like to test if the following unofficial binary Sigil package solves your keyboard issue, I'd appreciate it (I believe you were using the 64-bit version?).

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B5Cp...it?usp=sharing

Let me know if it resolves the problem and I'll get the 32-bit version uploaded and edit my Unofficial Linux Sigil thread.

YES

I installed the above 64 bits version of Sigil and it's my pleasure to report that I can now type the ô the usual way (accent first, letter second).

Congratulations for solving this tricky bug!! And thanks for your help to the Linux community.

[DiapDealer]

Good deal. Thanks for checking.