printing @ signs

[pikusinski]

I have a problem printing the "@" sign when using type_string. Anyone knows why? I have UTF-8 as encoding.

[SavinaRoja]

Can you describe the error? Does it generate a traceback? I can test it myself shortly.

[pikusinski]

Oh sorry. Sometimes I forget that people can't read my mind.

There is no error what so ever. It only prints a double quote

[SavinaRoja]

Hmmm, I am able to print that symbol on my computer with pykeyboard without issue. So you say that it prints a double quote instead of the @ symbol? This might be interesting. Could you copy the output of xmodmap -pke here?

[pikusinski]

Oh sorry. Forgot to say that this is a windows problem.

[SavinaRoja]

It looks like perhaps you have an American keyboard but a UK layout (or vice versa?).

[pikusinski]

I have a Swedish keyboard. But that gave me some hints. Will check it out.

[pikusinski]

So I've played around a bit and I see that when I'm using swedish as keyboard layout in windows, it prints a ". But when I change to english (US), it prints a @ sign.

Note that it's the target application that needs to have this keyboard setting. The rest of the applications don't need to change theirs.

So my question is, how can I gt around this problem?

[pikusinski]

A quick fix I've made was to let the program press shift + alt at the same time, which changes the keyboard layout. Then when typing is done, it changes back

[SavinaRoja]

PyKeyboard relies on the VkKeyScan method of win32api to convert a character to its appropriate windows keycode. http://docs.activestate.com/activepython/2.4/pywin32/win32api__VkKeyScan_meth.html So it might seem that for certain layouts, this function is not working properly?

[pepijndevos]

 I know that mac uses virtual scan codes, which are identical across layouts. It seems the windows api is giving you the raw hardware code.‎ Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone. From: Paul BartonSent: dinsdag 12 november 2013 02:30To: SavinaRoja/PyUserInputReply To: SavinaRoja/PyUserInputSubject: Re: [PyUserInput] printing @ signs (#19)PyKeyboard relies on the VkKeyScan method of win32api to convert a character to its appropriate windows keycode. http://docs.activestate.com/activepython/2.4/pywin32/win32api__VkKeyScan_meth.html So it might seem that for certain layouts, this function is not working properly?

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[SavinaRoja]

I did find reference to another function that utilizes layout information http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms646332(v=vs.85).aspx in the windows API for C++. It is my understanding that the python API is linking to the C++ one; this function is not documented in the python API.

Both of VkKeyScan and VkKeyScanEx are meant to return 2 bytes of information (a short integer); the rightmost (low-order) byte is a statemask of modifiers, and the leftmost (high-order) is a virtual keycode for the character. The documentation for win32api.keybd_event is spartan and relatively unhelpful, but it does suggest a few different avenues to pursue for testing. I may need to do some direct testing and digging through the windows api C++ source code to properly understand how to account for different keyboard layouts.

We may eventually need to get a bit more elaborate...