On-Screen Keyboard Slash Key Mapping May Not Work (301977)

SYMPTOMS

When you are using the On-Screen Keyboard tool with a non-U.S. keyboard layout, clicking the forward slash (/) character on the numeric keypad may not generate this character on the screen.

For example, with a French keyboard layout, an exclamation mark (!) is displayed instead of forward slash (/) character.

CAUSE

The On-Screen Keyboard program uses the MapVirtualKey() API, which fails, or returns an invalid scan code for some keys on the numeric keypad.

For additional information concerning MapVirtualKey(), click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

72583 MapVirtualKey() Maps Keypad Keys Incorrectly

RESOLUTION

For each keyboard layout, there is usually an alternative way to create the forward slash (/) character with the On Screen Keyboard using a key not located on the numeric keypad. This may entail key combinations such as SHIFT+(character), ALT+SHIFT+(character), or LOCK+ALT+SHIFT+(character).

For example, with the French keyboard layout, you can first click SHIFT and the forward slash (/) key will be available on the row just above the space bar (the COLON [:] key without pressing SHIFT).

On many European keyboard layouts, such as Danish, Finnish, German and Italian, this key will appear as SHIFT+7 in the shift state.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article.