All dead keys on a Swedish keyboard don't seem to work in console mode. The key characters " (umlaut), ` (grave accent) and ' can be used to compose such characters on the command line. This works like it should. But using ^ or ~ doesn't work for producing a character with those accents. These keys aren't "dead keys" like they should be, and will thus only result in the accent itself getting typed. I've tested this on the command line and in console emacs, with the same result. It's a keyboard input/keymap problem. These problems are probably the same for Finnish too, as its the same keyboard layout as Swedish. kmaraas reported similar problems for Norwegian layout - and that probably affects Danish too, as those two layouts are identical. Maybe kenneth can confirm that one?
They aren't marked as dead keys in the keytables... Are you sure they should be (for example, I think writing a shell script with ", ' and ` being dead keys must be a pain)? If so, which keys exactly need to be deadkeys (keycode preferred - I don't have swedish keyboards to test on... If you don't know the keycode, tell me the location of the key)?
Created attachment 1532 [details] Swedish 102-key layout
Created attachment 1533 [details] Danish 102-key layout
Created attachment 1534 [details] Norwegian 102-key layout
First of all, the Danish and Norwegian keyboards aren't the same. The Swedish and Finnish are though. Sorry for that mess. I went to school this evening and scanned in keyboard layouts from an old computer manual I have. There's also keyboard layouts in pure text here: http://anubis.dkuug.dk/keld/xkb_latin1.html Just to make sure, I summarize the keyboard issues on a Swedish keyboard in beta4 (bugzilla often mangles accents and stuff, so I'll be descriptive): To produce a character with a acute(?) accent ( ' ), press: "the key to the left of backspace", followed by "character". This works. To produce a character with a grave accent ( ` ), press: "shift" and "the key to the left of backspace", followed by "character". This works. To produce a character with umlaut ( ( ), press: "the key to the upper left of enter", followed by "character". This works. To produce a character with ( ^ ), press: "shift" and "the key to the upper left of enter", followed by "character". This does NOT work. To produce a character with ( ~ ), press: "AltGr" and "the key to the upper left of enter", followed by "character". This does NOT work. I reported a similar problem a while back (bug 9380) before RH6.2 - that was with the X keyboard maps though. The X keyboard maps were corrected in time for RH6.2 and has been correct ever since. I failed to check the console keyboard at that time though... And, no, you shouldn't use accents in shell scripts, you should use double (") or single apostophes ('). The single apostrophe is availiable as a handy simple (not dead or shift) key to the left of the enter key on a Swedish keyboard. :)
kenneth asked me to add this info (he will be away from a net connection a couple of days): The Danish keyboard in console mode doesn't work that good. He can't write the " (trema), 4 (accent), ` (grave accent), (cedille), ^ (circumflexe), ~ (tilde), reverse-^ (hacek) characters. Nothing works.
This defect is considered MUST-FIX for Winston Release-Candidate #1
Here are some more keys that don't work as expected on the Swedish keyboard: shift + "'" (to the left of the number key row) should produce a "=", not a degree sign as it does now shift + "4" should produce the international currency sign, not a cedille-c as it does now
Aaargh... kill Bugzilla kill kill... it mungled most of the characters in the above comment. This is what it should be like: shift + "legal paragraph sign" (to the left of the "1" on the number key row) should produce a "one half sign", not a degree sign as it does now shift + "4" should produce the international currency sign, not a cedille-c as it does now
Danish keys X (big O with a / through) also doesnt work. This is in the Danish keyboard.
Fixed in -19.