I'm running mac 10.5.4 and using emacs in an xterm window (not gtk
graphical). I've seen threads where the reverse of this behavior
(well some of it anyway) has been remedied before, but i haven't seen
any posts that talk about this:

- Pressing C-h deletes backwards instead of help. Running the
describe-key command says that it's DEL (backward-delete-char-
untabify).

- However, pressing the "Delete" key on my keyboard does backward-
delete as well...

- Pressing M-DEL (<- "Delete" on my keyboard) marks a paragraph.
Describe-key says that this combination is C-M-h, the mark-defun
command. For me, M-DEL used to be the 'backward-kill-word ' command
until i upgraded Xquartz.

I want to get my old key-bindings back:
Delete -> backwards-delete
M-Delete -> backwards-kill-word
C-h -> help

What's also really strange is that when i'm in xterm the M-DEL
actually does delete words backwards.

matthew.a.hess@gmail.com writes:

It depends on the terminal program, on what ASCII codes it sends when
you press what key.

You may try to change the "preferences" of your terminal program,
(control-left-click in xterm), and/or you could try to toggle this:
M-x normal-erase-is-backspace-mode RET
(You may type M-x as ESC x)

--
__Pascal Bourguignon__ http://www.informatimago.com/

sorry, should have included this information:

using xterm with these relevant environmental variables:

XTERM_LOCALE=C
XTERM_VERSION=XTerm(235)

also...

stty erase is set to ^H

the keysym for my keyboard "Delete" key is 59 which is listed as
BackSpace by xmodmap

no luck with fiddling in X11 preferences

matthew.a.hess@gmail.com wrote:

Do you mean the terminal that pops up when you open X11.app? If so, I
strongly encourage you to use Terminal.app. It will start X11
automatically if needed, has configuration dialog, and C-h works out of
the box.

regards,
Nikolaj Schumacher

On Aug 5, 7:54 am, Nikolaj Schumacher wrote:

Ugh... same issue. So this is a problem independent of X >:[

matt

Am 05.08.2008 um 06:32 schrieb matthew.a.hess:

Invoke 'stty -a' to see your recent settings. 'stty ^h' should clear
any binding of C-h.

(global-set-key (kbd "DEL") 'backward-delete) ?
(global-set-key (kbd "M-DEL") 'backward-kill-word) ?

--
Greetings

Pete

These are my principles and if you don't like them... well, I have
others.
- Groucho Marx

Not just in this case, but for some reason the elisp commands never
seem to do anything.

Stty says that my erase=^H. Tried 'stty ^h' but it's not an option
stty recognizes.

I'm having a hard time believing that i'm not the only one with this
problem...

matt

Am 06.08.2008 um 03:00 schrieb matt:

Then try to reserve another "character" for erase:

stty erase '^?'

This should free C-h. Obviously I should not have thought of the
characters but the actions, that are each bound to some character ...

--
Greetings

Pete (:
_ / __ - -
_/ \__/_/ - -
(´`) (´`) - -
`´ `´

Changing erase gives me back C-h -> help, but makes my "Delete" key
write '^H' in the terminal and do nothing at all in emacs. However,
when i use the C-DEL, it does delete backwards, and describe-key says
that that combo is just DEL ('backward-delete...).
Also, M-DEL still gives C-M-h.

Could it be that I should switch to an encoding other than ascii?

matt

Am 06.08.2008 um 18:19 schrieb matt:

I am still working with Tiger and a rather old version of X11. I seem
to remember that I had a similiar problem in xterm – it "popped up"
one day. It was surprising. Could be this entry in ~/.Xdefaults cured
it:

XTerm*ttyModes: erase ^?