Re: ESC DEL generates ESC C-d

[Daniel Ortmann]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@is.elta.co.il> writes:

> On 2 Dec 2001, Daniel Ortmann wrote:

>>>> On a FreeBSD-stable system under X, ESC DEL now generates ESC C-d

>>> That's the expected and correct behavior: Emacs by default remaps
>>> DEL into C-d.  If you type "C-h l" (that's a letter ell, not a digit
>>> one), you will see that Emacs did receive DEL.

>>> For more details, see the node "Deletion" in the Emacs manual.

>> This same version of emacs generates ESC DEL on the Solaris system at
>> work.

> Probably because Emacs on Solaris thinks that there's only one erasure
> key, and it maps it to DEL.  What is the value of
> normal-erase-is-backspace on each one of these two systems?

>> Furthermore, note these two lines from C-h m performed in a dired-x
>> mode buffer:

>> ESC C-d         dired-tree-down
>> ESC DEL         dired-unmark-all-files

>> If ESC DEL is always mapped into ESC C-d then how could both of these
>> functions be invoked?

> Try ESC BS; on the machine where ESC DEL produces ESC C-d, ESC BS
> should produce ESC DEL.  (BS is the Backspace key.)

> Yes, I know this is a bit of a mess, but Emacs cannot do much better,
> given that different keyboards have different keys to erase text
> called by different names.  The Emacs manual tries to explain this
> complex issue in the nodes "Deletion" and "DEL Does Not Delete".

>> ESC DEL may indeed be remapped to ESC C-d in most locations, but it
>> appears incorrect for it to be done in a dired-x buffer.

> Given that ESC BS produces ESC DEL (it does for me), do you still
> think there is a problem?  If you do, please tell what problem do you
> see.

Yes!  It works!  Thank you.

Could some modification to the C-h m help text be made that would say
"try ESC BS if ESC DEL doesn't work"???

-- 
Daniel Ortmann, 2414 30 Av NW, #D, Rochester, MN 55901
ortmann@isl.net (h)   / 507.288.7732 (h)
dortmann@lsil.com (w) / 507.529.3887 (w)