Some keyboard-shortcuts not working when Openboard in German

[StefanL38]

I just installed OpenBoard 1.5.4.240 today.

I have chosen german language and I have a german keyboard-layout though shortcuts seem to be not all working

I read about Ctrl-p activating pen  Ctrl-e activateing erase etc. But it does not work in my installation.

So what do I need to change wherever to make it work?

If the software has not integrated keyboard-shortcuts I ask you why? 

it's a PC software mouse-tossing for everything is uneffective! 

So what is the reason to have keyboard-shortcuts not yet implemented?

best regards Stefan

[GavinSmith0123]

I found out what the shortcuts were from an old version of the Wikipedia page:

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=OpenBoard&oldid=984658110

Notably C-i is for the pen, C-e for erase, C-f for select and C-j for a straight line.

[letsfindaway]

Hi @StefanL38,

please be aware that OpenBoard is an open source project, maintained and developed by volunteers in their free time. It does not help to accuse those people that they did not already do what you expect. Instead contribute and make the project better!

What seems to be missing here is some good and easy-to-find documentation. So contribute it!

OpenBoard already has many keyboard shortcuts. You can find the definition of keyboard shortcuts in the following file: https://github.com/OpenBoard-org/OpenBoard/blob/master/resources/forms/mainWindow.ui

Look for lines containing <property name="shortcut">. They are always part of an <action name="..."> and link a keyboard shortcut to an action. You can easily identify the action by its name, text and tooltip. If you need more help in understanding the file content, please ask for specific support.

From this information you can build a complete list of available shortcuts. Create some good documentation and contribute it to the project! Perhaps it will be part of the next edition of the user manual.

You see, that's how open source works: Don't complain. Instead ask for advice and contribute. Help making OpenBoard even better!

Have fun!
Martin

[StefanL38]

Hi Martin,

well at least that is a start. So I looked into the linked file and searched for the first occurence of "shortcut"

I found this one

<action name="actionStylus">
   <property name="checkable">
    <bool>true</bool>
   </property>
   <property name="checked">
    <bool>true</bool>
   </property>
   <property name="icon">
    <iconset resource="../OpenBoard.qrc">
     <normaloff>:/images/toolbar/stylus.png</normaloff>:/images/toolbar/stylus.png</iconset>
   </property>
   <property name="text">
    <string>Stylus</string>
   </property>
   <property name="iconText">
    <string>Stylus</string>
   </property>
   <property name="shortcut">
    <string>Ctrl+T</string>
   </property>
  </action>

I tried pressing Ctrl-T   but nothing happened. Mabye OpenBoard has to be in some kind of special mode to react on Ctrl-T?

Then I searched the second occurence

<action name="actionRedo">
   <property name="icon">
    <iconset resource="../OpenBoard.qrc">
     <normaloff>:/images/toolbar/redoOn.png</normaloff>:/images/toolbar/redoOn.png</iconset>
   </property>
   <property name="text">
    <string>Redo</string>
   </property>
   <property name="shortcut">
    <string>Ctrl+Y</string>
   </property>
  </action>

The action "Redo"  should be available at all "modes"

I drawed some lines. Clicked on the undo-button with the mouse and then tried Ctrl-Y

Nothing happened. There did NO Redo happen! Clicking on the buttons with the mouse worked. But not the shortcut.

So my guessing is: either the software-version I'm using is a version that does not support shortcuts

or the actual version has a big bug that it is not working at all.

So I tried looking up some kind of version number. Usually in almost any software under main menu-help there is an entry "About"

where the version can be found. OpenBoard has no menu-entry "about" 

I tried "Check for update"  and got the message "no update available"  and no version-number was shown.

Now I'm asking myself did I install some old klunky version? 

If yes where can I download the most stable and / or actual version?

I removed openboard and downloaded it new from here https://openboard.ch/download.de.html

And installed it again. Language geram. I tried it again. Drawing some lines clicking on the undo-button with the mouse

then tried Ctrl-Y. Nothing happened.

I googled for "Openboard download" and found hits like this

OpenBoard, the best interactive whiteboard for schools and ...

From the experience described above I call this the best exaggeration of trying to describe a software.

So if you can write me where to download the software-version that has working shortcuts, And describe how to install it in all details so the shortcuts really work. I will give it a try.

best regards Stefan

[letsfindaway]

When I press Ctrl-T, then it switches the stylus palette on and off. I repeated your test with Ctrl-Y, and it worked as expected. So let's try to find out what happens on your side.

The OpenBoard version can be displayed with OpenBoard > Preferences > About. Current stable version is 1.5.4. I tested it with the developer version (1.6.1) on Linux, but I think there should not be any chances for the shortcut buttons.

What platform are you on? Windows/MacOS/Linux? Can probably anybody else tell what happens here?

[StefanL38]

I'm using OpenBoard on Windows 10

This is the text that is shown in the about section

OpenBoard 1.5.4

OpenBoard is copyright © 2020. All rights reserved.

OpenBoard is derived from Open-Sankoré. Open-Sankoré is copyright © 2010-2015 Groupement d'Intérêt Public pour l'Education Numérique en Afrique (GIP ENA). All right reserved.

OpenBoard is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, version 3 of the License, with a specific linking exception for the OpenSSL project's "OpenSSL" library (or with modified versions of it that use the same license as the "OpenSSL" library). You can find the source code of this software at github.com/OpenBoard-org.

OpenBoard is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License below for more details.

Contact :

Service écoles-médias

Rue des Gazomètres 5

Case Postale 241

1211 Genève 8

Switzerland

openboard.ch

emails: [email protected], [email protected]

best regards Stefan

[StefanL38]

I installed OPenBoard 1.5.4 on two other laptops with Windows 10.

Same result. Hotkeys are NOT working

So did anybody ever test the windows version lately?

best regards Stefan

[kaamui]

Hello,

The difficulty is to reproduce it. We already had some users complaining about some shortcuts not working, but we could not reproduce it.

I just tried and no issue. Then I tried with -lang de and I was finally able to reproduce it. I have some shortcuts working (zoom in/out with Ctrl+I/O, copy/cut/paste, select all, etc) but not other ones like undo/redo..

I don't know why there is such difference with -lang de though... I tried with es, en, it, fr and no issue.

I'll try to look at it soon

[letsfindaway]

I found a very old similar bug report for a completely other project: https://bugs.launchpad.net/mixxx/+bug/908540. Here it had to do with the fact, that the Qt installation did not find the proper qt_de.qm translation files normally delivered together with Qt. This made it impossible to interpret some of the translated shortcuts (e.g. Ctrl+T translated to Strg + T in OpenBoard_de.ts).

Just a hint - not sure whether it is a similar issue.

Note: in es, it and fr, Ctrl+T is translated to Ctrl+T, and not to some locale specific string...

[letsfindaway]

I can confirm that this issue also appears on Linux, with a definitely intact Qt installation. My proposal is to remove the translations from the German language files, or to replace them by identical strings, just as in the other languages you tested.

@kaamui: I could provide a merge request for that at the next weekend. Would this help?

[letsfindaway]

Additional comment: I just checked, and the problem is not the translation itself, but that e.g. Ctrl+Z is translated to Strg + Z with blanks around the plus sign.

I checked all languages: Only German is doing this. I will provide a pull request over the weekend.

[letsfindaway]

As a workaround until a new version of OpenBoard is released you might download the following German translation file, unzip it and place it in your applications i18n directory. The location of this directory is platform specific and I cannot exactly tell you where it is. On Linux it is typically /usr/share/OpenBoard/i18n. On Windows it should be somewhere within the program installation directory.

OpenBoard_de.qm.zip

[StefanL38]

Hi letsfindaway,

your way does not work. 

I have the OpenBoard.exe located here:  C:\Program Files (x86)\OpenBoard\OpenBoard.exe

I unzipped your OpenBoard_de.qm.zip-file and copied the file into this folder:  

C:\Program Files (x86)\OpenBoard\i18n\OpenBoard_de.qm

Keyboard-shortcuts are still not working. 

I haven't analysed all details of this problem. But to me it seems that you haven't coded a clearly separation between functionality and language-specific variations Trying to save time with this now bites you costing etxra-time.

best regards Stefan

[letsfindaway]

Hi Stefan,

yepp I see, you're right. The language file seems to have to fit to the executable version. I built it for the development version of 1.6.1. It seems not to be suited for 1.5.4.

Sorry, I did not realize that before.

Martin

[torbennehmer]

@kaamui @letsfindaway In my german Windows 10 installation Shortcuts still seem to fail. What works is the default copy/paste shortcuts (Ctrl+C/V/X) and - interestingly, Openboard zooms in on CTRL+I and out on CTRL+O - which per #82 should be CTRL+SHIFT+I/O. I can't trigger anything else via CTRL hotkey. I have freshly installed Openboard today, Version lists 1.6.1.240 as installed.