[Solved] Function keys in urxvt

[kexolino]

Googling skills must be pretty crappy, cause I found next to nothing concerning this. My problem is that in urxvt none of the F keys work like they should, instead they just write a ~ (all through F1-F12). Any pointers, what I should look for to solve this? Here's my .Xresources, though nothing in it has to do with these keys:

Code: Select all

Xft.autohint: true
Xft.antialias: true
Xft.hinting: true
Xft.hintstyle: hintslight
Xft.rgba: rgb
Xft.lcdfilter: lcddefault
Xcursor.theme: DMZ-White

URxvt*termName: xterm-256color
URxvt.geometry: 80x22
URxvt.scrollBar: false
URxvt.iconFile: /usr/share/icons/Faenza/apps/48/xterm.png

URxvt*letterSpace : 1
URxvt.font: xft:Terminus:pixelsize=9
URxvt.boldFont: xft:Terminus:pixelsize=9

URxvt.perl-ext-common:  default,matcher
URxvt.urlLauncher:      x-www-browser
URxvt.matcher.button:   1

URxvt.keysym.Control-Up:   \033[1;5A
URxvt.keysym.Control-Down:    \033[1;5B
URxvt.keysym.Control-Left:    \033[1;5D
URxvt.keysym.Control-Right:    \033[1;5C
URxvt*keysym.Home: \033[1~
URxvt*keysym.End: \033[4~

! Mustang color scheme
*background:#1a1a1a
*foreground:#fff
*color0:#000000
*color1:#ff6565
*color2:#93d44f
*color3:#eab93d
*color4:#204a87
*color5:#ce5c00
*color6:#89b6e2
*color7:#cccccc
*color8:#555753
*color9:#ff8d8d
*color10:#c8e7a8
*color11:#ffc123
*color12:#3465a4
*color13:#f57900
*color14:#46a4ff
*color15:#ffffff

urxvt version is 9.19-1, on "vanilla" Sid (upgraded from a Wheezy netinstall).

[kexolino]

Allright, it turns out that the problem is only with htop and only with F1-F4, only in urxvt - as far as I can see (tried in xterm and xfce4-terminal, everything fine there). The keys in other applications like Midnight Commander and Weechat are working fine; also it doesn't matter if it's in tmux or not. Not a big deal, because there are other keys that do the same things as F1-F4, but still it would be good to know why this is happening.

[pidsley]

rxvt-unicode or rxvt-unicode-256color? I have rxvt-unicode 9.19-1, and I can't duplicate this problem with htop. The only difference I see is that I don't have any of this in my Xresources:

Code: Select all

URxvt.perl-ext-common:  default,matcher
URxvt.urlLauncher:      x-www-browser
URxvt.matcher.button:   1

URxvt.keysym.Control-Up:   \033[1;5A
URxvt.keysym.Control-Down:    \033[1;5B
URxvt.keysym.Control-Left:    \033[1;5D
URxvt.keysym.Control-Right:    \033[1;5C
URxvt*keysym.Home: \033[1~
URxvt*keysym.End: \033[4~

and I don't define the termName variable. I'm curious why you are setting it to xterm when you are using urxvt?

You might try going back to a more vanilla Xresources just to see if that maks a difference.

[kexolino]

It is rxvt-unicode-256color, and removing URxvt*termName: xterm-256color seems to have fixed it. I think I added it when I was fiddling with Weechat colors, but bad move because I don't really know what it's for (if you cared to explain I'd be grateful)...

[pidsley]

It is rxvt-unicode-256color, and removing URxvt*termName: xterm-256color seems to have fixed it. I think I added it when I was fiddling with Weechat colors, but bad move because I don't really know what it's for (if you cared to explain I'd be grateful)...

I'm not 100% sure why this fixed the problem, but I think it is related to a slight difference in the way urxvt and xterm handle escape sequences, especially for the first four function keys. By setting termName to xterm-256color, you were telling programs to expect xterm escape sequences (and to send those sequences back), and they were in fact receiving urxvt escapes. Some programs didn't seem to mind, but htop did not work properly.

There are more clues in the Terminfo database and the infocmp command, but the short answer (as you discovered) is that it's not a good idea to set the termName to something you're not using. It just confuses everyone. :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rxvt
http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Text-Terminal-HOWTO-16.html

[kexolino]

Thanks for the explanation and links pids, they cleared things up :)