German keyboard support for gdm???

[Polytropon]

On Fri, 2 Feb 2018 17:08:46 +0100, Peter Ulrich Kruppa wrote:
> (I hope this webmailer doesn't produce any HTML mess - it's the first time
> I try it on a mailing-list)

Everything alright, no HTML garbage. :-)



> On Fri, Feb 2, 2018 at 2:11 PM, Polytropon <freebsd at edvax.de> wrote:
> 
> > On Fri, 2 Feb 2018 05:04:24 +0100, Peter Ulrich Kruppa wrote:
> > > does anyone know how to make gnome's display manager gdm understand
> > german
> > > keyboard input?
> >
> > Historically, you put an entry in /etc/X11/xorg.conf,
> > but today, this is not so easy anymore. There are at
> > least two options:
> >
> > a) Use X11 cofiguration /usr/local/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/keyboard-de.conf
> >
> >         Section "InputClass"
> >                 Identifier      "KeyboardDefaults"
> >                 Driver          "keyboard"
> >                 MatchIsKeyboard "on"
> >                 Option          "XkbLayout" "de"
> >         EndSection
> >
> That one I have found myself. It's nice to set german keyboard in twm or
> xfce4 , but is ignored by gdm.

This should be a X-wide setting, so the only reason for gdm to
ignore it is that somewhere else (!) a gdm setting says "en"
(and "don't use system's setting").

By the way, I've been using Gnome 2 and gdm in the past, with
german keyboard support, but as Gnome 3 became unusable, I
switched the particular systems to Mate and slim. Both seem
to honor the X-wide setting (global) for keyboard.

By the way, you could also try a partial xorg.conf with the
content mentioned above, located in /usr/local/etc/X11.



> > b) Use HAL configuration /usr/local/etc/hal/fdi/policy/x11-input.fdi:
> >
> >         <?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?>
> >         <deviceinfo version="0.2">
> >           <device>
> >             <match key="info.capabilities" contains="input.keyboard">
> >                   <merge key="input.x11_options.XkbModel"
> > type="string">pc102</ merge>
> >                   <merge key="input.x11_options.XkbLayout"
> > type="string">fr</merge>
> >             </match>
> >           </device>
> >         </deviceinfo>
> >
> This one I didn't know. I tried it and checked if hald is started. Result:
> Nothing, not even a french keyboard :-)

I'm almost sure Gnome still requires HAL and DBus in order
to run; do you have

	hald_enable="YES"
	dbus_enable="YES"

in your /etc/rc.conf? Maybe

	gnome_enable="YES"

implies them.



> And by the way: The space in </ merge> (behind pc102) will produce some
> error.

Yes, that seems to be a reformatting issue (indentation with
one tab, manually). And of course it should be "de" instead
of "fr". :-)



> > c) Use Gnome's configuration utility (the one which can also
> > configure gdm). I've never used that, so I cannot be more
> > specific, sorry. :-)
> >
> Which one might that be: I have got gnome-control-center, gnome-tweak-tool
> and dconf-editor and can't see where anything about gdm could be done ...

That is very strange. Still I seem to remember that there was
a tool to configure gdm, but I cannot remember what it was...



> But in the meantime I found this:
> 
> https://help.gnome.org/admin/system-admin-guide/stable/keyboard-layout.html.en
> To me it sounds as if I either need the program localectl , which is only
> available on Linux or a /dev/input/event which can be produced by
> installing libudev-devd and rebuilding xorg-server with DEVD option - see
> the README at
> 
> https://help.gnome.org/admin/system-admin-guide/stable/keyboard-layout.html.en
> I will try that, but it will take some time on this old box.

Both localectl and udev are Linuxisms. Maybe Gnome 3 isn't actually
as cross-platform as it claims? ;-)




-- 
Polytropon
Magdeburg, Germany
Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0
Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...