From: mharris AT blackwidow DOT saultc DOT on DOT ca
Date: Sun, 9 Mar 1997 22:35:58 -0500 (EST)
Reply-To: mharris AT blackwidow DOT saultc DOT on DOT ca
To: "Ian 'DrDebug' Day" <Ian AT darkblak DOT demon DOT co DOT uk>
cc: OpenDOS discussion list <opendos AT mail DOT tacoma DOT net>,
        Ross Meeks the 29th <rmeeks AT sympatico DOT ca>
Subject: Re: [opendos] [OpenDOS] Wishlist part 2
In-Reply-To: <4UsbKOABEDFzEwrY@darkblak.demon.co.uk>
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On Wed, 26 Feb 1997, Ian 'DrDebug' Day wrote:

> On Wed, 26 Feb 1997 at 00:18:11, Alaric B. Williams wrote:
> >> A better candidate would be then YEN symbol.  :o)
> >
> >I don't know about US keyboards, but my UK device has an otherwise
> >useless key to the left of the 1 digit, under Esc, which has three
> >symbols on it: ` =AC and |, although to get | I push shift-\.
>=20
> The Alt-Gr-Funny_key gives a char 179 under DOS, and a =A6 under windoze.

I was using the cyrillic font under Linux, and the above
character showed up like this:

 \|/
 /|\

Now I changed to the default IBM font and it is an "a" with a
line under it like this:

 a
 -

Only on one line.


> I generally use the ` character for my norton guide clone (popup help=20
> thing) for precisely the reason that it's pretty redundant otherwise, so=
=20
> yes, using a Shift/Alt/Ctrl whatever combination would be good.

The ` character is used in 4DOS, and in Linux as well, the only
way to get a free character is to make a new keyboard.  :o)

=20
> >Perhaps a use could be made for the =AC character? I've no idea how
> >it'll come out on your machines, but on my system it's a top right
> >hand corner of a single thickness ASCII box!

That symbol *was* a small capital M on my screen (with the
Cyrillic font that I like), however, it is now a "one quarter"
symbol.  ie:  1/4
It changed from the M into 1/4 after I changed fonts.  Upper
ASCII is not going to work for this.

=20
> Not quite, it's not identical.  It's a char 170, whereas the top right=20
> corder one is char 191.
> Like you said, who knows what keys the funny US keyboards have  :)

Well, my Canadian keyboard has the keys that were on the original
IBM AT.  I've looked at the various foreign keyboard layouts in
the back of my DOS book, and all of the keys that differ from the
Canadian/US keyboard are all non-english keys and symbols, and
they all reside in the 129-255 range of non-standard hi-ascii.
Bummer.  To bad that UNICODE wasn't made 50 years ago.  Also,
it's too bad that IBM limited us to a cheesy 101 key keyboard.
If I had it my way, my keyboard would have at least 48 function
keys, and about 20 or 30 other keys (for box drawing, foreign
keys, whatever...., perhaps maybe even some programmable keys.
Do foreign keyboards have the "gorga" key?


Mike A. Harris        |             http://blackwidow.saultc.on.ca/~mharris
Computer Consultant   |    My webpage has moved and my address has changed.
My dynamic address: http://blackwidow.saultc.on.ca/~mharris/ip-address.html
mailto:mharris AT blackwidow DOT saultc DOT on DOT ca

Xwindows: Forget '95.  Use a REAL GUI.