Adding keys to a existent layout

[Charles Albert]

Hello. I am using a MacOSX on a hackintosh of mine, and would like to
know if there is any way of using Ukelele to add a key to an existing
keyboard layout. The problem is: my notebook have a brazilian keyboard
layout, with 12 keys between left and right shift keys, instead of
those normally 10 keys. Happens that those 2 lost keys have slashes
and pipe and also interrogation character so those are pretty
important. I've managed to map those using control + QWER, but it
would be really nice if i could put the original keys to work. How
about it, is it possible to do it?

[Sorin Paliga]

I do not understand very well what you write. Usually, a so-called U.S. ISO keyboard has 11, not 12, keys between the two shift keys. I do not understand why you have 12.
I also cannot figure out what you lost, if you have 2 extra keys. U.S. physical keyboards, those having 10 keys, lack the so-called backslash (BKSL) key, the role of which is taken by the key left to 1 and, what is there, vanishes, unless doubled at another level (e.g. option-LETTER).
You cannot lose anything, it is probable what you are looking for is at another level. Activate Keyboard Viewer (from where you activate keyboard layouts), press Option/Alt key, and see whether the missing chars are not there.
Perhaps a useful utility would be DoubleCommand, by which you may change the function of system keys.
And to answer your question: you may adjust almost any key with UKELELE, so you may also change the location of most chars, give a try and see whether this fits your wish.

04.05.2011 v 23:51, Charles Albert:

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[John Brownie]

The issue is really that you can't see the keys on the screen because it
doesn't match an Apple keyboard. It's important to note that this does
not affect the functionality of the keys themselves, just the display
within Ukelele.

There are two ways to handle this. One is to try some of the other
keyboard types for display. From the View menu, choose Keyboard Type�,
and try to find a keyboard type that has keys that match your missing
keys. They may be in different places, but that's just a detail. If you
press one of the extra keys, and a key shows as being down, that means
that this particular key code is generated by that key, which may be in
a different location on the keyboard.

The other way is to make use of the key code. Make sure that the info
inspector is open, and press the key to see its code in the key code
section. Then you can set the output of the key by choosing Edit Key�
from the Keyboard menu, and choosing it by key code.

Hope that gets you going.

John
--
John Brownie, john_b...@sil.org or j.br...@sil.org.pg
Summer Institute of Linguistics | Mussau-Emira language, Mussau Is.
Ukarumpa, Eastern Highlands Province | New Ireland Province
Papua New Guinea | Papua New Guinea

[Geke]

It looks like the best Keyboard Type for your purpose is USB Pro
Keyboard.
You may need to try it alternately with Coding: JIS and Coding: ISO.

Maybe John could think of adding some typical Windows Keyboard Types
to Ukelele?
With Mac using USB for keyboard connection, many people these days are
using Ukelele to adapt to keyboards made for PCs.

Best regards,

Gé

[John Brownie]

On Thu May 05 2011 23:22:32 GMT+1000 (PGT) Geke wrote:
> Maybe John could think of adding some typical Windows Keyboard Types
> to Ukelele?
> With Mac using USB for keyboard connection, many people these days are
> using Ukelele to adapt to keyboards made for PCs.

It would be nice, but somewhat difficult. The approach that I take at
present is to look for the 'KCAP' resources, which provide the layout
data for Apple's keyboards. There's no simple approach to making those
resources for non-Apple keyboards, as it's a very old file format which
is rather quirky and encoded in binary rather than text-based.

The alternative is to have some sort of description of PC keyboards.
Does Windows have such a collection? I just don't know Windows well
enough to begin looking for one. If such a thing existed, it would not
be terribly hard to add such capability to Ukelele. Anyone got pointers
for me?

[Geke]

I could have a look at the KCAP structure to see how that works. How
to go about that, or maybe you have some good overview somewhere? I’m
rather new to this, but I guess it’s mainly about the relationship
between keycodes and hardware configuration? Reminds me of the time
when I was editing keyboard icons in ResEdit hex mode...

I’m not great with Windows either. This may be a starting point:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa227572(v=VS.60).aspx
Scroll down to "Keyboard type".