Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!apple!rutgers!netnews.upenn.edu!eniac.seas.upenn.edu!hodas
From: hodas@eniac.seas.upenn.edu (Josh Hodas)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Greek font - keyboard mapping problem
Message-ID: <6867@netnews.upenn.edu>
Date: 28 Dec 88 13:03:20 GMT
References: <11462@reed.UUCP>
Sender: news@netnews.upenn.edu
Reply-To: hodas@eniac.seas.upenn.edu.UUCP (Josh Hodas)
Organization: University of Pennsylvania
Lines: 64

In article <11462@reed.UUCP> alexis@reed.UUCP (Alexis Dimitriadis) writes:
>Background-- Greek Macintoshes come with special fonts that contain both
>English as usual and Greek (in the high page of ASCII, perhaps?).  Typing
>Command-Space toggles btwn English and Greek mode.
>
>  Well, I have with me a system that did all that on a Mac Plus in Greece.
>When I try to use it here (in Oregon) I can view Greek files fine, but
>Command-space has no effect, so there is no way to enter a Greek character.
>(Not even by keeping down the option key etc.) I can, however, cut and paste
>Greek text.
>
>  I am guessing that whatever the European/International keyboard sends on 
>command-space the American one doesn't.  So: Does someone know how I can 
>generate the required code on an American keyboard?  Or what the problem
>_really_ is??
>
>I have:
>  System 4.1 - N 6  (Greek version)
>  Finder 5.5 - N 6	(ditto)
>  Macwrite 4.6    	(vanilla)
>
>Any sort of help, or suggestions on who would know, will be greatly 
>appreciated.
>
>Thanks,
>Alexis Dimitriadis
>alexis@reed.UUCP
>(...tektronix!reed!alexis)

Ahh, what fun.  Well, before you get alot of obscure answers that are based
on very good general knowledge about the script manager but are inappropriate
to this problem, let me tell you what I was told when I was trying to get
system software from the Apple distributor in Cyprus this summer.

The schmucks have burned the modified keyboard handlers into rom. (even
on the SE and II).  While this may be reasonable on the Kanji macs
because of the enormous fonts required, it is totally unreasonable
on a machine that involves just a custom KCHR and a small custom font.

Now I have discovered that SMK greek keys is based on a customized version
of the greek system software. Unfortunately it has been set up for typing
ancient greek, and since it uses all the different breathings, etc. it
has 14 dead keys, and the basic ones (which are on the ; and : keys on 
a greek keyboard) are on option-w and option-(something else I forget)
in SMK.  I am right in the middle of decoding the modified KCHR and 
reverting it back to the regular modern greek version as we speak.

I hope to have it done by the weekend, and will send the patches to anyone
who wants them (note this will require buying SMK, but its fairly cheap.)

By the way, I have been told that the latest MacTutor had code for a nice
KCHR editor.  Did anyone type it in, and if so could you e-mail it to me
as I cant find the magazine anywhere.

Josh

-------------------------

Josh Hodas    (hodas@eniac.seas.upenn.edu)
4223 Pine Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104

(215) 222-7112   (home)
(215) 898-5423   (school office)