Re: That DEL key thing...

[Bob Proulx <bob%proulx.com@localhost>]

pl wrote:
> Bob Proulx wrote:
> > I would want to see the output of "stty -a" and see what the erase
> > settings are set to in the tty driver.
>
> pl@toasterbawx:/home/pl~$ stty -a
...
> 	eol2 = <undef>; erase = ^?; intr = ^C; kill = ^U; lnext = ^V;

The important part in the above is this part.

> 	... erase = ^?; ...

The tty driver's erase character is set to ^? the DEL character.  If
you want to use the ^H BS character for this then these two things are
mismatched.

    stty erase ^H

That will set the tty driver's erase character to ^H to match your
terminal's Backspace "<---" setting.  Consistent configuration is good.

> > DEL has never removed characters to the right in my experience.
> > However the Keypad Delete to the right is usually configured that way.
>
> I come from Windows, Linux background where BS removed from left and
> DEL erased to the right. FreeBSD behaves similiarly - Well, it
> also works that way on X11 on NetBSD. Meanwhile on wscons both
> remove to the left

I believe we have a communication problem.  When I say DEL I am
referring to the character identified as DEL from the ASCII character
table.  Also known as octal 177 and ^?.

    man ascii

> My EeePC lacks keypad. External USB keyboard generates "^[[3~" on
> keypad DEL which seems to have no effect in wscons (writes a tilde),
> in X11 it's same as the DEL key.

Your EeePC is the same as most Thinkpad keyboards.  There is a
"Backspace <---" key and there is a Delete key and both are near each
other.  The Delete key in that case is the Keypad Delete key and will
produce an ESC [ 3 ~ escape sequence which normally deletes characters
forward.  The Backspace key normally would produce either ^? or ^H as
has been discussed and deletes characters backward.

Bob