Making iTerm to translate 'meta-key' in the same way as in other OSes

Question

In bash shell with emacs key-binding, you can use key combination like M-f, M-b to move one word forward or backward on the shell prompt respectively. Usually, the meta key is mapped to Alt key on Windows and Linux. However, in iTerm, I could not find a way to map this meta key to either Option or Command key on my MacBook Pro.

It seems that in OS X, the meta key is by default mapped to ESC key. So you can use ESC-f, ESC-b on iTerm. However, ESC key is apparently not practical to use. In addition, iTerm does have option that allow you to modifier mapping for the meta key (Bookmarks > Profiles > Keyboard Profiles > Global > Option Key as...), this setting does not seem to work at all.

Therefore, if anyone know what is the solution to this problem, please let me know.

I have upgraded to the latest release, 0.9.6.1012, and this behavior is still persist.

Edit: Some clarification to my question. The key-binding I'm talking about is for bash shell, not in emacs. It just happens that, by default, bash shell also use the same key-binding as emacs.

Answer 1

Try "export LANG=C". I'm not emacs expert, but I found this enables emacs on OS X to recognize the Option key as the Meta key in iTerm,

Answer 2

I don't know about iTerm, but you can do this in Terminal. Instructions can be found here:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/162896/emacs-on-mac-os-x-leopard-key-bindings#162907

Answer 3

Try Option Key as +Esc

Works for me in emacs, though I'm not sure if it will have any other undesirable effects.

Answer 4

I couldn't get the Alt key working either but there is a workaround that makes it at least function for word navigation via the cursor keys:

Skip to Next or Previous Word in iTerm Using Alt / Option + Left or Right Arrow Keys

Answer 5

Opiton key as +Esc worked for me as well in irssi.

Answer 6

Go to Bookmarks > Manage Profiles. Then select Keyboard Profiles > Global and choose Option Key as Meta. This works for me in version 0.9.6.1201.

Answer 7

Go to Bookmarks > Manage Profiles. Then select Keyboard Profiles > Global and choose Option Key as +ESC.

Works in iTerm Build 0.9.5.0611 & Build 0.9.6.20090415

Answer 8

...and if you want to preserve your Option key as modifier (say, you use a keyboard layout that has some useful national characters bound as Opt+$key), there's a patch for iTerm to give you exactly that here

Answer 9

I found some solution on stackoverflow also, just go to keyboard profile and in "Global" change "Option key as" +ESC

that works for me perfectly =) btw some iterm patch exists also look here: http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/EmacsForMacOS