How to use virtual/on-screen keyboard in Xmonad - xmonad - Haskell.org

How to use virtual/on-screen keyboard in Xmonad

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Jakob Schöttl

31 Dec 2015 31 Dec '15

11:09 p.m.

Hello, I would like to use Xmonad to set up a custom, very restricted desktop environment on a Raspberry Pi with a touch screen. Because there is no hardware keyboard I need a virtual keyboard. I tried these programs: xvkbd, matchbox-keyboard, onboard, florence Some of them work with some other programs. But when it works, it's still buggy: - after typing I have to click two times to a new input field to set focus - virtual keyboard steals focus - other windows get invisible and only come back when they get focus (super+j) - doesn't work at all with some programs Is there a way to get virtual keyboards work with Xmonad, reliably and for all programs? Thank you! Jakob

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Bogdan Sinitsyn

31 Dec 31 Dec

11:25 p.m.

On Thursday, December 31, 2015 3:09:29 PM MSK Jakob Schöttl wrote:

Hello,

I would like to use Xmonad to set up a custom, very restricted desktop environment on a Raspberry Pi with a touch screen.

Because there is no hardware keyboard I need a virtual keyboard. I tried these programs: xvkbd, matchbox-keyboard, onboard, florence

Some of them work with some other programs. But when it works, it's still buggy:

- after typing I have to click two times to a new input field to set focus - virtual keyboard steals focus - other windows get invisible and only come back when they get focus (super+j) - doesn't work at all with some programs

Is there a way to get virtual keyboards work with Xmonad, reliably and for all programs?

Thank you!

Jakob

_______________________________________________ xmonad mailing list xmonad@haskell.org http://mail.haskell.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xmonad It this virtual keyboard _NET_WM_WINDOW_TYPE_DOCK or smth like this? If not, it may be useful to make it be of this type.

-- Bogdan Sinitsyn

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Jakob Schöttl

1 Jan 1 Jan

3:36 a.m.

On 31.12.2015 15:25, Bogdan Sinitsyn wrote:

On Thursday, December 31, 2015 3:09:29 PM MSK Jakob Schöttl wrote:

...
Because there is no hardware keyboard I need a virtual keyboard. I tried these programs: xvkbd, matchbox-keyboard, onboard, florence

Some of them work with some other programs. But when it works, it's still buggy:

- after typing I have to click two times to a new input field to set focus - virtual keyboard steals focus - other windows get invisible and only come back when they get focus (super+j) - doesn't work at all with some programs

Is there a way to get virtual keyboards work with Xmonad, reliably and for all programs?

Thank you!

Jakob

_______________________________________________ xmonad mailing list xmonad@haskell.org http://mail.haskell.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xmonad It this virtual keyboard _NET_WM_WINDOW_TYPE_DOCK or smth like this? If not, it may be useful to make it be of this type. No, at least florence and onboard are not (xprop | grep DOCK).

What is this property and how can I set it?

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Brandon Allbery

3:44 a.m.

On Thu, Dec 31, 2015 at 10:36 PM, Jakob Schöttl wrote:

On 31.12.2015 15:25, Bogdan Sinitsyn wrote:

...
On Thursday, December 31, 2015 3:09:29 PM MSK Jakob Schöttl wrote:

...
Because there is no hardware keyboard I need a virtual keyboard. I tried these programs: xvkbd, matchbox-keyboard, onboard, florence

Some of them work with some other programs. But when it works, it's still buggy:

- after typing I have to click two times to a new input field to set focus - virtual keyboard steals focus - other windows get invisible and only come back when they get focus (super+j) - doesn't work at all with some programs

Is there a way to get virtual keyboards work with Xmonad, reliably and for all programs?

Thank you!

Jakob

_______________________________________________ xmonad mailing list xmonad@haskell.org http://mail.haskell.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xmonad

It this virtual keyboard _NET_WM_WINDOW_TYPE_DOCK or smth like this? If not, it may be useful to make it be of this type.

No, at least florence and onboard are not (xprop | grep DOCK).

What is this property and how can I set it?

You probably can't set it, at least early enough for it to matter. http://standards.freedesktop.org/wm-spec/latest/ar01s05.html#idm139870830002... You could however look for other properties in xprop output (probably you wan WM_CLASS) and doIgnore it in the ManageHook so it won't take focus and will float. Do the programs where it doesn't work under xmonad, work with it under another window manager? X11 actually makes this hard to do, for security reasons. xvkbd probably uses sendEvents, which some programs ignore as potential security issues (they are flagged by the X server as synthetic). If you enable the XTest extension and use a virtual keyboard that supports XTest, it will work reliably... but you've opened a bit of a security hole in the X server since now malicious programs can do things like injecting commands into a terminal with a root shell in it. (xmonad has no control whatsoever over this, it is the X server that controls it.) -- brandon s allbery kf8nh sine nomine associates allbery.b@gmail.com ballbery@sinenomine.net unix, openafs, kerberos, infrastructure, xmonad http://sinenomine.net

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Bogdan Sinitsyn

10:22 a.m.

On Thursday, December 31, 2015 10:44:11 PM MSK Brandon Allbery wrote:

On Thu, Dec 31, 2015 at 10:36 PM, Jakob Schöttl wrote:

...
On 31.12.2015 15:25, Bogdan Sinitsyn wrote:

...
On Thursday, December 31, 2015 3:09:29 PM MSK Jakob Schöttl wrote:

...
Because there is no hardware keyboard I need a virtual keyboard. I tried these programs: xvkbd, matchbox-keyboard, onboard, florence

Some of them work with some other programs. But when it works, it's still buggy:

- after typing I have to click two times to a new input field to set focus - virtual keyboard steals focus - other windows get invisible and only come back when they get focus (super+j) - doesn't work at all with some programs

Is there a way to get virtual keyboards work with Xmonad, reliably and for all programs?

Thank you!

Jakob

_______________________________________________ xmonad mailing list xmonad@haskell.org http://mail.haskell.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xmonad

It this virtual keyboard _NET_WM_WINDOW_TYPE_DOCK or smth like this? If not, it may be useful to make it be of this type.

No, at least florence and onboard are not (xprop | grep DOCK).

What is this property and how can I set it?

You probably can't set it, at least early enough for it to matter. http://standards.freedesktop.org/wm-spec/latest/ar01s05.html#idm139870830002 400

You could however look for other properties in xprop output (probably you wan WM_CLASS) and doIgnore it in the ManageHook so it won't take focus and will float.

Do the programs where it doesn't work under xmonad, work with it under another window manager? X11 actually makes this hard to do, for security reasons. xvkbd probably uses sendEvents, which some programs ignore as potential security issues (they are flagged by the X server as synthetic). If you enable the XTest extension and use a virtual keyboard that supports XTest, it will work reliably... but you've opened a bit of a security hole in the X server since now malicious programs can do things like injecting commands into a terminal with a root shell in it. (xmonad has no control whatsoever over this, it is the X server that controls it.) If it's just ignored, it theoretically could be overlapped by some new windows. But if xmonad thinks it's strut(it doesn't have to be of the dock type for this), it wouldn't be overlapped. Another solution is to make it always stay on top of other windows, but I don't know how to do it with xmonad if it's ignored.

-- Bogdan Sinitsyn

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Brandon Allbery

2:52 p.m.

On Fri, Jan 1, 2016 at 5:22 AM, Bogdan Sinitsyn wrote:

If it's just ignored, it theoretically could be overlapped by some new windows. But if xmonad thinks it's strut(it doesn't have to be of the dock type for this), it wouldn't be overlapped. Another solution is to make it always stay on top of other windows, but I don't know how to do it with xmonad if it's ignored.

Only floating windows would overlap it; tiled windows would go below it. I don't think this would be too much of a problem in practice though. (Partly because floating windows are badly behaved anyway --- note that the strut is only applied to tiled windows!) -- brandon s allbery kf8nh sine nomine associates allbery.b@gmail.com ballbery@sinenomine.net unix, openafs, kerberos, infrastructure, xmonad http://sinenomine.net

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Paul Fertser

6:37 a.m.

On Thu, Dec 31, 2015 at 03:09:29PM -0800, Jakob Schöttl wrote:

Because there is no hardware keyboard I need a virtual keyboard. I tried these programs: xvkbd, matchbox-keyboard, onboard, florence

I can tell you that I'm very satisfied with xvkbd and Xmonad on my smartphone. Please see http://paste.debian.net/359010/ (as gitorious.org still hasn't migrated the repositories to web archive...).

Some of them work with some other programs. But when it works, it's still buggy:

I didn't notice any issues with the apps I use with this config. -- Be free, use free (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html) software! mailto:fercerpav@gmail.com

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Jakob Schöttl

2 Jan 2 Jan

3:49 a.m.

On 31.12.2015 22:37, Paul Fertser wrote:

On Thu, Dec 31, 2015 at 03:09:29PM -0800, Jakob Schöttl wrote:

...
Because there is no hardware keyboard I need a virtual keyboard. I tried these programs: xvkbd, matchbox-keyboard, onboard, florence I can tell you that I'm very satisfied with xvkbd and Xmonad on my smartphone.

Please see http://paste.debian.net/359010/ (as gitorious.org still hasn't migrated the repositories to web archive...).

...
Some of them work with some other programs. But when it works, it's still buggy: I didn't notice any issues with the apps I use with this config. Thanks for sharing your config! I just tried xvkbd. When ignored it works with all my other programs! (On system, it can only be launched with a terminal and not with dmenu.)

I just have to position it somehow. At the moment it's at 0/0.

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Brandon Allbery

3:50 a.m.

On Fri, Jan 1, 2016 at 10:49 PM, Jakob Schöttl wrote:

I just have to position it somehow. At the moment it's at 0/0.

Look for a -geometry parameter, or possibly specify one in .Xresources. You probably can't position it within xmonad, at least not sanely. -- brandon s allbery kf8nh sine nomine associates allbery.b@gmail.com ballbery@sinenomine.net unix, openafs, kerberos, infrastructure, xmonad http://sinenomine.net

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Paul Fertser

8:09 a.m.

On Fri, Jan 01, 2016 at 10:50:51PM -0500, Brandon Allbery wrote:

On Fri, Jan 1, 2016 at 10:49 PM, Jakob Schöttl <[1]jschoett@gmail.com> wrote:

I just have to position it somehow. At the moment it's at 0/0.

Look for a -geometry parameter, or possibly specify one in .Xresources. You probably can't position it within xmonad, at least not sanely.

Yes, I just have xvkbd.windowGeometry: 480x200+0+440 xvkbd.compact: true And as you might have noticed, I do not stop it when I need screen space, I just let Xmonad cover it, and once I need the keyboard, I press a hardware button to reveal it back. -- Be free, use free (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html) software! mailto:fercerpav@gmail.com

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participants (4)

Bogdan Sinitsyn
Brandon Allbery
Jakob Schöttl
Paul Fertser