+----  how to make your own keymap file. ----+

first of all, later on you will be able to choose the keymap, but right now it
selects the keymap according to your language setting. for example, if your 
language is "ko", it will select $OPIE_DIR/share/multikey/ko.keymap for the
keymap. so if you want to make a german keymap, copy the en.keymap file to
de.keymap, and edit it. 

your best friend is xmbfed. open the unicode font that is in
$QT_DIR/lib/fonts/unifont.bdf and search for the characters you want to input. 
in the keymap file, the columns are...

+--- row number (there are 5 rows)
| +- qcode (used for special chars like enter, escape, etc...)
| |
v v
1 0         0x36    2
            ^       ^
            |       |
            |       +---- width of key (default key should be 2)
            +--- the unicode value (the one you see in xmbded)

so, lets say you want to edit the 5th key on the 2nd row. find the 5th line
that starts with 2, and replace the 3rd column with the code you found in 
xmbdfed. save the file and test it out by restarting opie, or running 

host$ $OPIEDIR/bin/qcop QPE/TaskBar "reloadInputMethods()" 

it worked, right?  if all you see is a square in it's place, that means your
default font doesn't have that char. go to appearance and change the font to
one that has that char.

and if you want, you can have an image as the label instead of the char itself.
just draw the xpm image in gimp or something, save it, open it in your text
editor, cut off all the surrounding stuff and leave only the stuff between the
" chars. place that after your key definition. not too hard, right?

about shift and meta characters. to place chars in the shift map, the line
should consist of two columns. the non-shifted char and the shifted char. for
example. 

0x36   0x46

so, 0x36 shifted is 0x46. and for meta chars. the reason why you have this 
feature is because of languages like german, where you can hold down the 
meta-alt key and enter in other special characters. it's like having
a second shift. to add chars to this map, you do the following.

m 0x36  0x84

and here, if you hold down the meta-alt and hit the 0x36 key, 0x84 would be
input. get it?

if you have problems, suggestions, or just want to tell me something, you can
contact me at jake at asdfnews.org

jake richardson