Issue with iPad Keyboard when connecting to a VMWare VNC session

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Bill Shonts

December 26, 2011 02:53

Using Jump Desktop 4.0.5 on my iPad 2 (iOS 5.0.1) I am encountering an odd issue with the keyboard when connecting to a VNC session hosted by VMWare Workstation 8.  I am able to connect to the session just fine but when I use the keyboard to type an "@" it shows up as "2".  To get the "@" character (and any other shifted character) I must use the soft-shift key above the virtual keyboard and press "2".  I am also forced to use the soft-shift key for caps since the normal ipad shift key doesn't appear to do anything.  This problem also occurs when using a bluetooth keyboard.

I'm convinced this is an issue with the communication between jump desktop and VMWare's VNC server implementation since I am able to use jump desktop just fine when connecting to my mac via VNC and I'm able to connect to VMWare's VNC server without issue from my mac's Screen Sharing application.  Have I missed some basic configuration option to get VMWare's VNC Server properly working with Jump Desktop?

Thanks!

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  Jump Desktop Support January 18, 2012 05:36

  Sorry about the delay in getting back to you.

  Looks like VMWare's VNC server is incorrectly mapping keys sent from Jump - or Jump isn't sending the correct set of keys back to VMWare's VNC server.  You might have to edit VMWare's settings to use a vnckeymap file that matches a US English keyboard (I'm not entirely sure about this since I havne't tested this with VMware yet)

  Can you please a look at this VMWare help article: http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1004815 ? 

  Try setting it to a US English keyboard layout. 

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  Jump Desktop Support January 18, 2012 06:07

  Update: I just tried this with VMWare Fusion 4.x - unfortunately, setting RemoteDisplay.vnc.keymap="us" in the vmx file did not have any effect. I also tried with the "uk" layout without any luck.

  Also, I think the reason the VMware VNC server works correctly with your Mac's 'Screen Sharing' app is because you actually press the 'Shift' key on your physical keyboard to create the "@" sign which causes 'Screen Sharing' to first send the shift key press and then the @ sign. This is exactly what you're doing in Jump when you manually press the "Shift" button from the menu. I tried this out with a beta version of Jump's new Mac viewer app and it worked correctly because with a physical keyboard Jump knows when you need pressed the 'Shift' key on the keyboard and sends the raw event to VMWare server. 

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  Jump Desktop Support October 20, 2012 18:53

  We just released Jump Desktop 5.0 on the App Store. It has a bunch of fixes related to shifted characters. Can you please give it a shot? 

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