3 xkbcommon is a keymap compiler and support library which processes a
4 reduced subset of keymaps as defined by the XKB specification. Primarily,
5 a keymap is created from a set of Rules/Model/Layout/Variant/Options names,
6 processed through an XKB ruleset, and compiled into a struct xkb_keymap,
7 which is the base type for all xkbcommon operations.
9 From an xkb_keymap, an xkb_state object is created which holds the current
10 state of all modifiers, groups, LEDs, etc, relating to that keymap. All
11 key events must be fed into the xkb_state object using xkb_state_update_key().
12 Once this is done, the xkb_state object will be properly updated, and the
13 keysyms to use can be obtained with xkb_state_key_get_syms().
15 libxkbcommon does not distribute a dataset itself, other than for testing
16 purposes. The most common dataset is xkeyboard-config, as used by all
17 current distributions for their X11 XKB data. More information on
18 xkeyboard-config is available here:
19 http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/XKeyboardConfig
23 See [Quick Guide](doc/quick-guide.md).
27 While xkbcommon's API is somewhat derived from the classic XKB API as found
28 in X11/extensions/XKB.h and friends, it has been substantially reworked to
29 expose fewer internal details to clients. The supported API is available
30 in the xkbcommon/xkbcommon-*.h files. Additional support is provided for
31 X11 (XCB) clients, in the xkbcommon-x11 library, xkbcommon/xkbcommon-x11.h.
35 Relative to the XKB 1.1 specification implemented in current X servers,
36 xkbcommon has removed support for some parts of the specification which
37 introduced unnecessary complications. Many of these removals were in fact
38 not implemented, or half-implemented at best, as well as being totally
39 unused in the standard dataset.
43 + there were very few geometry definitions available, and while
44 xkbcommon was responsible for parsing this insanely complex format,
45 it never actually did anything with it
46 + hopefully someone will develop a companion library which supports
47 keyboard geometries in a more useful format
48 - KcCGST (keycodes/compat/geometry/symbols/types) API
49 + use RMLVO instead; KcCGST is now an implementation detail
50 + including pre-defined keymap files
52 + may come in an optional X11 support/compatibility library
53 - around half of the interpret actions
54 + pointer device, message and redirect actions in particular
55 - non-virtual modifiers
56 + core and virtual modifiers have been collapsed into the same
57 namespace, with a 'significant' flag that largely parallels the
60 + completely unused in current keymaps, never fully implemented
62 + almost completely unused in current keymaps
64 + used to implement radio groups and overlays, and to deal with things
65 like keys that physically lock; unused in current keymaps
66 - indicator behaviours such as LED-controls-key
67 + the only supported LED behaviour is key-controls-LED; again this
68 was never really used in current keymaps
72 - extended number of modifiers
73 - extended number of groups
74 - multiple keysyms per level
75 + this requires incompatible dataset changes, such that X11 would
76 not be able to parse these
80 An extremely rudimentary homepage can be found at
83 xkbcommon is maintained in git at
84 https://github.com/xkbcommon/libxkbcommon
86 Patches are always welcome, and may be sent to either
87 <xorg-devel@lists.x.org> or <wayland-devel@lists.freedesktop.org>
89 Bugs are also welcome, and may be reported either at
90 Bugzilla https://bugs.freedesktop.org/describecomponents.cgi?product=libxkbcommon
92 Github https://github.com/xkbcommon/libxkbcommon/issues
95 - Daniel Stone <daniel@fooishbar.org>
96 - Ran Benita <ran234@gmail.com>
100 Many thanks are due to Dan Nicholson for his heroic work in getting xkbcommon
101 off the ground initially.