分类: LINUX
2008-03-23 17:09:00
The keymapping problem can be traced back to the time when computers used punched tapes. The only way to correct a wrongly punched character was to punch additional bits in the tape (or rather, punch additional bits _out_ of the tape). Characters with all the bits punched were treated as deleted characters. See 'man ascii' for a list of the ASCII characterset, you'll see that DEL, (octal 177, decimal 127 and hexadecimal 7F) is the one with all the bits punched in (the ASCII code with the highest value). To be able to overwrite a character it is necessary to undo the feed between the characters first. For this the ASCII BS (octal 010, decimal 8, hexadecimal 08) was used. So to erase the last-typed character, you would have to press first BS to move back one character, and then DEL to delete the character. In newer computers either BS or DEL was chosen to move back and delete in one press. |