Hi, Thanks very much - "--textenc UTF-8" works for us! For the sake of others with the same issue reading this in the archives, I just want to be pedantic and point out that I doubt "--textenc UTF-8" is some magic panacea that will work for all systems. The issue seems to be that the encoding Pharo uses should match that of the surrounding system, which, for us, happens to be UTF-8 but could be different for others. I was a bit sloppy when I spoke of "middle button paste". I don't mean that the Pharo's paste command should be bound to the middle mouse button. I meant that Pharo should be able to paste the type of X11 selection (primary selection) that some other apps like terminals traditionally paste when you press the middle button. And that is still not implemented: I need to explicitly press "Copy" in Chrome before it is pasted to Pharo, just highlighting the text does not work.

Hi,

try setting the encoding of pharo to unicode when launching from command line and see if that fixes your problem: --textenc UTF-8

The default encoding is not unicode which messes pasting from some applications (e.g. Google Chrome 35+). As far as middle mouse button pasting goes I do not believe Pharo supports it - at least I haven't found any code related to it (although I would love to have this functionality).

Peter

On Tue, Jan 20, 2015 at 2:58 PM, Pieter Nagel <pieter@nagel.co.za> wrote:

...

Our team is very frustrated with figuring out how copy & paste is supposed to work in Pharo 3 under X11.

Maybe there's something we misunderstand, or can configure?

We can't copy and paste text directly from other X11 apps into Pharo. We need to first paste the text into text editors like GEdit or XEmacs, and then we can copy and paste the text from there into Pharo.

I think this has something to do with X11's complicated model of primary vs. clipboard selection. The primary selection is typically created by just highlighting some text, and then (by common convention) can be pasted from by just pressing the middle mouse button. The clipboard selection is typically created by explicitly using Copy or Cut commands.

Strange thing is, if we start with text in (for example) Google Chrome, then neither type of selection can be pasted into Pharo. If we start with text in (for example) GEdit, then both types of selection can be pasted into Pharo.

We're using Unity under Ubuntu 12.04, if that makes a difference.

Advice?

Thanks.

Please add an issue. We are concerned about shortcut management. But the VM sometimes does not provide the correct information :( We hope that the SDL layer will help us simplifying this problem.

Hi,

there are several things at play here as far as I was able to find out.

I was researching this issue when I was frustrated with pasting from Chrome and was able to figure at out at least a temporarily solution. Here's my original post http://forum.world.st/Re-Copy-past-doesn-t-work-sometimes-in-Chrome-semifixe... I also opened an issue today, however I'm not familiar with VM so I cannot conclusively say what is correct. https://pharo.fogbugz.com/f/cases/14759/Linux-X11-VM-default-encoding-should...

As far as middle mouse pasting goes there are two sides of it: 1. Does Pharo VM (C-side) support it? 2. Does Pharo (Smalltalk-side) support it?

I believe the answer to the first one is yes, the code does make mentions of primary selection, however the code is quite complex for me (my investigation was pretty much trial & error)... https://github.com/pharo-project/pharo-vm/blob/master/platforms/unix/vm-disp...

However the answer to second one is probably not, at least I was not able to find any bindings between middle mouse button and pasting - but again, I'm not familiar with Pharo internals. I could open an issue for this also, however considering the code is quite old (years) and nobody fixed it yet, nobody seems to be really bothered by it. I for example prefer ctrl+c clipboard selection over middle mouse primary selection, but if you have the knowledge to fix this (which I don't have), then feel free. :)

Peter

Hi pieter

Hi,

Thanks very much - "--textenc UTF-8" works for us!

For the sake of others with the same issue reading this in the archives, I just want to be pedantic and point out that I doubt "--textenc UTF-8" is some magic panacea that will work for all systems. Obviously. Pieter do you really think that we are satisfied with the situation? No certainly not. Now do you imagine the huge todo we have?

If your team is using Pharo then it may be good to think that this is also your system and you can help you and us.

The issue seems to be that the encoding Pharo uses should match that of the surrounding system, which, for us, happens to be UTF-8 but could be different for others. Indeed. I was a bit sloppy when I spoke of "middle button paste". I don't mean that the Pharo's paste command should be bound to the middle mouse button. I meant that Pharo should be able to paste the type of X11 selection (primary selection) that some other apps like terminals traditionally paste when you press the middle button. We started to add SDL and we should do a large pass on the events in the future. But time is scarced

And that is still not implemented: I need to explicitly press "Copy" in Chrome before it is pasted to Pharo, just highlighting the text does not work.

...

Hi,

try setting the encoding of pharo to unicode when launching from command line and see if that fixes your problem: --textenc UTF-8

The default encoding is not unicode which messes pasting from some applications (e.g. Google Chrome 35+). As far as middle mouse button pasting goes I do not believe Pharo supports it - at least I haven't found any code related to it (although I would love to have this functionality).

Peter

On Tue, Jan 20, 2015 at 2:58 PM, Pieter Nagel <pieter@nagel.co.za> wrote:

...

Our team is very frustrated with figuring out how copy & paste is supposed to work in Pharo 3 under X11.

Maybe there's something we misunderstand, or can configure?

We can't copy and paste text directly from other X11 apps into Pharo. We need to first paste the text into text editors like GEdit or XEmacs, and then we can copy and paste the text from there into Pharo.

I think this has something to do with X11's complicated model of primary vs. clipboard selection. The primary selection is typically created by just highlighting some text, and then (by common convention) can be pasted from by just pressing the middle mouse button. The clipboard selection is typically created by explicitly using Copy or Cut commands.

Strange thing is, if we start with text in (for example) Google Chrome, then neither type of selection can be pasted into Pharo. If we start with text in (for example) GEdit, then both types of selection can be pasted into Pharo.

We're using Unity under Ubuntu 12.04, if that makes a difference.

Advice?

Thanks.