XPost: comp.lang.c++   
   From: janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com   
      
   On 2026-02-02 13:14, David Brown wrote:   
   >   
   > If that is the case, then that is a good reason for choosing US layout.   
   > But AFAIK the differences between the US and the UK layouts are very   
   > small.  And a large proportion of computer users use Latin keyboards,   
   > even if their native languages use significantly different writing   
   > systems.  So keyboard layout is often partially independent of other   
   > language and locale choices.   
      
   Yes.   
      
   > For example, I use a Norwegian layout   
   > keyboard, but have my locale set to UK (with the region set to Norway).   
      
   It seems to be similar to, e.g., a German keyboard...   
      
   > Changing to the UK keyboard layout would be silly - it would mean some   
   > symbols are in a different place, and I could not type the Norwegian   
   > letters I need when writing in Norwegian.   
      
   ...where the German specific letters are in the same place as the   
   Norwegian specific letters. Exceptions are the location/ordering   
   of quite some of the punctuation characters. (And of course the   
   infamous QWERTZ vs. QWERTY cultural detail.)   
      
   > Changing to US layout would   
   > be a step sillier, and there would be no advantages.   
      
   Well, an advantage - and here we're getting on-topic again - is   
   writing programs in C-like languages; the access to the braces and   
   brackets is a pain (IMO) with those "Latin based" layouts.   
      
   That's why I'm running two keyboards in parallel on my system, one   
   with DE and one with US layout. - But in practice I rarely use the   
   US keyboard - despite its advantage for C-like programming - because   
   of the mentioned differences of many important control characters   
   (and the Y/Z placement); my muscle memory would make too many typing   
   mistakes.   
      
   >   
   > If you are used to a keyboard with a different writing system - say,   
   > Greek - then you might find it convenient to change to a Latin based   
   > layout for writing in English.   
      
   Actually many Greek letters are "naturally" transcribed to Latin   
   (Alpha, Sigma, Delta, Phi, Gamma, etc. to A, S, D, F, G, etc.), so   
   it's not much hassle to use one or the other keyboard type. (But   
   some letters, Latin or Greek, don't exist in the other language and   
   will be mapped to use their respective places on the other type of   
   keyboard.)   
      
   > But I see no reason why you might have a   
   > preference for US layout over UK - either would be fine.   
      
   The locale issues are of course another thing. I'm using a mixture   
   of 3 or 4 locales in my system defaults; for example: LC_NUMERIC=C   
   (for the numeric dot), en_DK (for the time format), en_US (basically),   
   de_DE (for the writing). - This mixed setting somehow feels wrong to   
   me. Since what I want to set and use is in principle neither language   
   specific nor country specific (although cultures associated with   
   language and countries use specific conventions reflected in their   
   locale setting). I'd probably want something like "iso_UN" (not really   
   but that may come close); using ISO dates and time, DIN paper sizes,   
   SI units, and my language specific collate setting (which varies when   
   I'm writing in more than one language).   
      
   Janis   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)