If a compositor broadcasts keyboard modifiers (i.e. send the alt/ctrl/etc events to all clients rather than just that one with keyboard focus) then all clients know what keyboard layout is being used because the modifier thing contains that information.

IIRC the Wayland protocol is not specific on whether or not compositor should broadcast modifiers.

labwc does broadcast modifiers. I have been told that KWin and Weston also do pass modifiers to unfocused clients whereas Mutter does not.

On a related note, broadcasting modifiers also helps with make ctrl+click work on unfocused xdg-shell windows.

The keyboard-layout client was just the most basic implementation I could write to test it and prove the functionality. It can be used as a proof-of-concept for panels and other desktop components to implement the same.

I think I'm right in saying that a new protocol would be needed to do anything more sophisticated, like changing the keyboard layout (which can currently only be done via keybinds in labwc by setting XKB_DEFAULT_OPTIONS, for example XKB_DEFAULT_OPTIONS=grp:shift_caps_toggle).

Ref:

Uh oh!

Keyboard layout module for labwc #4101

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