[AD] [ alleg-Bugs-3194187 ] [OS X] ALLEGRO_EVENT_KEY_CHAR not always generated

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Bugs item #3194187, was opened at 2011-02-27 15:47
Message generated for change (Comment added) made by elias
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Category: Mac OSX
Group: None
Status: Open
Resolution: None
Priority: 5
Private: No
Submitted By: Evert Glebbeek (eglebbk)
Assigned to: Peter Hull (peterhull90)
Summary: [OS X] ALLEGRO_EVENT_KEY_CHAR not always generated

Initial Comment:
When pressing a key with a non-printable character (eg, an arrow key), I don't get KEY_CHAR events, only KEY_DOWN and KEY_UP events. This is fine if the intention for the KEY_CHAR event is to enter text, but from the description in the manual it appears that it should work for non-printable characters as well.
I'm actually fine with the current behaviour (text input and key presses for controling a game are two distinct operations, after all), but I suspect it's not the intended behaviour and not consistent across platforms.
The relevant piece of code in src/macosx/keybd.m is

         ALLEGRO_EVENT event;
                         event.keyboard.type = ALLEGRO_EVENT_KEY_DOWN;
                         event.keyboard.timestamp = al_get_time();
                         event.keyboard.display   = dpy;
                         event.keyboard.keycode   = scancode;
                         event.keyboard.unichar   = 0;
                         event.keyboard.modifiers = 0;
                         event.keyboard.repeat    = false;
                         if (!is_repeat) {
                                 _al_event_source_emit_event(&keyboard.es, &event);
                         }
                         if (unicode > 0)
                         {
                                 event.keyboard.type = ALLEGRO_EVENT_KEY_CHAR;
                                 event.keyboard.unichar = unicode;
                                 event.keyboard.modifiers = modifiers;
                                 event.keyboard.repeat = is_repeat;
                                 _al_event_source_emit_event(&keyboard.es, &event);
                         }


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>Comment By: Elias Pschernig (elias)
Date: 2011-02-27 16:01

Message:
This is a bug. Arrow keys of course need to generate KEY_CHAR events (how
can you ever make a text entry box otherwise?) and they do so both in Linux
and Windows as intended. What should happen for a cursor key press is:

KEY_DOWN, KEY_CHAR, KEY_CHAR (repeat), ..., KEY_UP

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