Default keyboard layout of a Gnome Terminal

Question

In Ubuntu 16.04 I have 2 input methods (keyboard layouts) configured, CZ (default) and US. Also I have enabled different input methods for different windows. This configuration works as expected and so far I like it, but I would like to modify its behavior in one special case.

I would like to set the initial layout of a terminal window (GNOME Terminal) to US. The problem is that now, when I open the terminal window, a default language or the language of the previous window (according to the configuration) is used, which is not US every time.

I tried to add setxkbmap -layout us to ~/.bashrc, it changed the layout, but the layout indicator (in the top right corner) did not change and when the terminal window lost and regained focus, the modification done by setxkbmap was no longer applied. It seems to me that the daemon which takes care of managing per-window layouts didn't register the modificatin by setxkbmap. A command which tells the daemon to use a given layout for the actual window would probably solve my problem.

Try: gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.input-sources current 0 instead (or possibly the number needs to be 1, depending on how you have ordered your layouts). — Gunnar Hjalmarsson, Mar 12 '17 at 13:02
Adding gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.input-sources current 1 works for me. Ideally I'd like to specify US directly, but it is not necessary. @GunnarHjalmarsson if you create an answer, I'll accept it. — bedrorom, Mar 12 '17 at 16:33
I can't, since the question was marked as a duplicate. @JacobVlijm: Any chance to reconsider that? — Gunnar Hjalmarsson, Mar 12 '17 at 19:44
@JacobVlijm: It's very close. But in this case the combination of having enabled different methods for different windows and that single command in ~/.bashrc is sufficient. I'm not sure that solution fits at the other question. — Gunnar Hjalmarsson, Mar 12 '17 at 20:07
@GunnarHjalmarsson just post the answer. Please mention, though, that OP needs to match the number with actual position of input method in the indicator. Your original comment reads as if it's always either 0 or 1, which is not always the case. — Sergiy Kolodyazhnyy, Mar 12 '17 at 20:15

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 12 '17 at 21:01

Given that you enabled different input methods for different windows, it should be sufficient to replace the setxkbmap command in ~/.bashrc with:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.input-sources current 0

Please note that the number is the order number of the input sources you added, and the 0 (zero) is just an example which presupposes that English (US) is the the first input source item. Change it to 1 if English (US) is the second one etc.

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Apr 18 '21 at 11:34

You can even set your available layouts with

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.input-sources sources "[('xkb', 'de+neo_qwertz'), ('xkb', 'de')]"

In this case its the German layout with neoqwertz and the normal German layout.

I needed this to set my layout on ArchLinux with Gnome 40, because settings crashes after activating show-all-sources and navigating to Settings → Keyboard → +

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.input-sources show-all-sources true

Default keyboard layout of a Gnome Terminal

2 Answers2