May I rework XKB ?

[Dirk Wallenstein]

I needed a way to generally demonstrate my programming skills and as there is
no such thing as an XKB keymap editor by which you can generally edit an XKB
description (key types, actions, radio buttons, ...), I thought that laying the
foundation for such an app is the right thing in any case. 

Of course it would be nice if I could continue to program at Duttulm, and
to some extent, a very limited set of device configuration would be possible
without changes to XKB itself. In any case the next development steps are
strongly related to things that could improve and simplify XKB itself. 

One of the reasons for the subject line, was to signal that I am willing to
take part in anything that can improve XKB (coding, raising awareness,
summarizing state). 

As such please see the following as ideas and not as receivables.

- A clearer distinction between the use of modifiers for key type level
  determination and the use of modifier-attributes (and not virtual modifiers)
  that influence client side behavior (Alt or ScrollLock would be such
  attributes).
  
- Making modifier info available to clients. In particular it could be
  possible to obtain a name for a real-modifier and to obtain modifier
  attributes. Maybe offer info about which keys hold a particular modifier bit.
  
- An easy way for clients to determine if the key-event is a final one (for
  example a key event generating a shortcut keysym without an associated
  string) or a state changing event (actions for modifiers, controls, anything
  the clients might want to be informed about)
  
- An easy way for clients to determine which modifiers took part in the keysym
  generation (basically 'state & keytype->mods'). This together with the
  modifier info and the distinction between final- and state-change-events
  would make shortcut assignment easier on the client side.
  

So, my next steps would be a job application tour to ask if there is any
corporate interest in making keymap configuration available through Duttulm. I
would love to hear any comments or advices regarding that.

Greetings, Dirk.