Need advice on keyboard mapping

[janne]

I have a somewhat unusual problem: I need to use a keyboard layout for
one language (Swedish) on a keyboard designad for another one
(Japanese). Of course, anyone purchasing a laptop in a different country
than their own would likely have the same situation.

Now, to some extent, It Just Works (tm). I just choose Swedish layout,
and I mostly get my keys where I want them (some keycaps won't
correspond to reality anymore, of course, but that is a very minor
problem).

My real problem is that Swedish keyboards have an extra key between the
"z" and the left Shift, that contains "<", ">" (with Shift) and
"|" (with right Alt/AltGr). I can currently get "<" and ">" by first
hold RightAlt, add Shift, then press "z" and "x", respectively (the
opposite order will not work). "|" is, however entirely unavailable.

Obviously, it's not feasible to physically add that missing key through
software, but what I do need to do is to remap the keyboard slightly.
Ideally, I would want to coopt the Windows key on the row below - I
never use it anywhere, and it is very close to the intended place for
the extra key I am missing. Failing that, I would settle to just get
"<", ">" and "|" mapped somewhere more convenient (RightAlt "z", "x",
and "c" would be acceptable, as would RightAlt ",", "." and "/").

The question is how to go about it. Previously, when I have had this
problem, I have made an .xmodmap that have solved it - sort of, more or
less (can't ever seem to get the "|" mapping completely right). Ubuntu -
like other modern distros - is using the xkeyboard extensions, however.
On my FC2 machine, I simply load an xmodmap manually, effectively
disablin the xkeyboard extension. Thsi brings a number of problems,
though, so I'd really want to avoid it.

I am inclined to perhaps create a new keyboard for xkeyboard with the
modifications I need, but I'm really not sure on how to go about it, or
if there isn't perhaps an easier way - some way to tweak and change an
existing configuration rather than having to create an entirely new one.

So, if anyone on the list have encountered this issue, I would be
interested to hear about how you've solved (or not solved) it.


-- 
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
 
Tel. (Japan) 090-3622 8920            Dr. Jan Morén (mr)
                                      Dept. of Cognitive Science
http://lucs.lu.se/people/jan.moren    Lund, Sweden