Changes/IBus 1.5.29

IBus 1.5.29

This is a proposed Change for Fedora Linux.
This document represents a proposed Change. As part of the Changes process, proposals are publicly announced in order to receive community feedback. This proposal will only be implemented if approved by the Fedora Engineering Steering Committee.

Summary

IBus 1.5.29 will work with Plasma Wayland more closely using the Wayland protocol.

Owner

• Name: Takao Fujiwara
• Email: fujiwara [at] redhat [dot] com

Current status

• Targeted release: Fedora Linux 39
• Last updated: 2023-08-10
• devel thread
• FESCo issue: https://pagure.io/fesco/issue/3044
• Tracker bug: <will be assigned by the Wrangler>
• Release notes tracker: <will be assigned by the Wrangler>

Detailed Description

• IBus will be able to switch the keyboard layouts with the panel icon menu in Plasma Wayland.
• IBus will be able to show the candidate popup window near the input cursor in Plasma Wayland.
• IBus will be able to switch the keyboard layouts with the shortcut key in Plasma Wayland.

Benefit to Fedora

IBus will use Wayland input-method protocol in Plasma Wayland and handle the key events and switch keyboard layouts and the position the candidate popup window.

Scope

• Proposal owners: ibus 1.5.29

• Other developers: Akira TAGOH

• Release engineering: #Releng issue number

• Policies and guidelines: N/A

• Trademark approval: N/A (not needed for this Change)

• Alignment with Community Initiatives:

Upgrade/compatibility impact

You need to unset QT_IM_MODULE and GTK_IM_MODULE environment variables in Plasma Wayland desktop only but not Plasma Xorg desktop and follow the Setup section below.

How To Test

Setup

1. Install Plasma Wayland desktop and Log into the desktop session.
2. Run konsole and type env and if you find QT_IM_MODULE=ibus or GTK_IM_MODULE=ibus, you need to run im-chooser and select "No Input Method" and make sure QT_IM_MODULE and GTK_IM_MODULE environment variables are not set on konsole.
3. Run systemsettings5 and open "Input Devices" -> "Virtual Keyboard" and select "IBus Wayland" and press "Apply" button.
4. Focus on the konsole input context and IBus panel icon will be shown.

Panel Menu

1. Run kwrite and open a new document.
2. Focus on the input context in kwrite and click IBus panel icon to show the panel menu.(May need to click kwrite again to open the menu)
3. Select a keyboad layout on the panel menu and IBus can switch the keyboard layouts.

Input Method List with Shortcut Key

1. Run kwrite and open a new document.
2. Focus on the input context in kwrite and type Super-space to show the input method engine popup window.(May need to click kwrite again to open the popup)
3. Select a keyboad layout on the popup window with some space keys pressing Super key and IBus can switch the keyboard layouts.

User Experience

IBus had not supported to switch the keyboard layouts since Plasma Wayland has been integrated in Fedora but now IBus can switch both the keyboard layouts and input method engines and IBus candidate window is now shown near the input cursor and those are useful for the users.

Dependencies

Other IBus packages and KDE packages don't need to be rebuilt. We use systemsettings5 to enable IBus in Plasma wayland as the first implementation. The configuration with imsettings is nice to have in Fedora 39 GA but will be implemented later.

Contingency Plan

• Contingency mechanism: Revert the change to ibus.
• Contingency deadline: Beta release
• Blocks release? No

Documentation

TBD