129: Why doesn't my Meta key work in an xterm window?
Try all of these methods before asking for further help:
* You may have big problems using "mwm" as your window manager. {Does
anyone know a good generic solution to allow the use of the Meta key in
Emacs with mwm?}
* For X11: Make sure it really is a Meta key. Use "xev" to find out what
keysym your Meta key generates. It should be either Meta_L or Meta_R.
If it isn't, use xmodmap to fix the situation.
* Make sure the pty the xterm is using is passing 8 bit characters.
"stty -a" (or "stty everything") should show "cs8" somewhere. If it
shows "cs7" instead, use "stty cs8 -istrip" (or "stty pass8") to fix
it.
* If there is an rlogin connection between the xterm and the Emacs, the
"-8" argument may need to be given to rlogin to make it pass all 8 bits
of every character.
* If the Emacs is running under Ultrix, it is reported that evaluating
(set-input-mode t nil) helps.
* If all else fails, you can make xterm generate "ESC W" when you type
M-W, which is the same conversion Emacs would make if it got the M-W
anyway. In X11R4, the following resource specification will do this:
XTerm.VT100.EightBitInput: false
(This changes the behavior of the insert-eight-bit action.)
With older xterms, you can specify this behavior with a translation:
XTerm.VT100.Translations: #override \
Meta: string(0x1b) insert()
You might have to replace "Meta" with "Alt".