Re: Re: Emulation of Alt+Numpad+Digits behavior

On Wed, Aug 04, 2004 at 07:28:08PM +0200, Jörg Henne wrote:
> So why do I want the Alt-Numpad feature anyway, 
> you may ask. The reason is simple: some specialized devices like 
> keyboards with integrated readers for Smartcards or keyboard-wedge style 
> barcode readers transmit their data via this mechanism. And their reason 
> to use it, is that it offers a channel which is guaranteed to be 
> transparent. i.e. unencumbered by keyboard mappings etc.

I am really surprised to read this.  My understanding is that Alt+xxx in
DOS/Windows enters the character xxx from the OEM code page, while
Alt+0xxx enters the character xxx from the ANSI code page.  The specific
OEM/ANSI code pages depend on the selected system locale and are *not*
the same everywhere -- they might be cp437 and cp1252 on your machine,
but they will most likely be cp775 and cp1257 on my machine.  In other
words, the channel is not really transparent -- it depends on the system
locale that the hardware device cannot know.

It's been a while since I used Windows, so I might be mistaken, but I
do not think I am.

Marius Gedminas
-- 
We've found by experience that people who are careless and sloppy writers are
usually also careless and sloppy thinkers (often enough to bet on, anyway).
	-- ESR (http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html)

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