gVim + US-International: Not combining dead keys with space

Question

Hi,

I am using "United States-International" on Windows 7, which courses problems in combination with gVim 7.3.

In the US-International keyboard layout the keys " and ' are dead keys, that means, you can combine them with another key. For example pressing "+a results in ä and the keys '+a in á. In order to insert one double quote you simply have to hit "+space.

But when I enter "+space in gVim nothing happens, no character is inserted. When I further hit space, only spaces are inserted. It seems that the keys "+space are not combined to one " character. However combining " with a to ä works as expected.

When I press the " key followed by spaces, the " is buffered until I enter another char and is then combined with that (if possible). Examples:

"+space+space+a => » ä«  
"+space+space+b => » "b«
"+space+space+" => » ""«

Does anyone know how to solve this problem?

BTW, the behaviour isn't affected in vim (through cmd.exe)

Answer 1

Are you in edit mode or command mode when you do this? It sounds to me like you are expecting command mode to work like edit mode. The quote character in command mode affects registers and the clipboard (e.g., for copy/paste).

Answer 2

I noticed that you can press " and then a to produce ä. On my machine (Windows XP) if I press and hold " and <Space> at the same time, it seems to work. If I try to press " and then <Space>, I get unexpected behavior.