f1, f2, f3, f4 not working in putty

As seen on: http://<email address hidden>/msg01525.html

> PuTTY sends the same escape sequences as (IIRC) the linux console for
> F1-F4 by default. This is a problem because it sets its $TERM to 'xterm',
> which on many systems has different F1-F4 escape sequences. You may be
> able to fix yhe behavior by going into the PuTTY config, changing the
> setting about the function keys to (again, IIRC) 'xterm R6' and saving
> that in your default settings.

I can confirm that making this change made the F2/F3/F4 keybinds work in Putty 0.60/WinXP.

I confirm the workaround. Do not chosse "Linux" or the default choice like "ESC[n~"), but "Xterm R6" in the Terminal/Keyboard binding.

Maybe this has to be documented in the help.

I have the same problem with gnome-terminal. F1-F4 does not work. Changing TERM from xterm to gnome does make it work though.

FYI, I'm going to "fix" this bug by documenting it in the screen-profiles(1) manpage.

Thanks for the report, and the detective work for solving the issue!

Cheers,
:-Dustin

This bug was fixed in the package screen-profiles - 1.29-0ubuntu1

---------------
screen-profiles (1.29-0ubuntu1) jaunty; urgency=low

  * bin/ec2-cost: add --force, and --detail mode for stand-alone runs; test for
    existence of /etc/ec2-version for Amazon instance (LP: #335274), allow
    local use to turn ec2-cost on
  * bin/updates-available, keybindings/common, profiles/common, screen,
    screen-profiles, select-screen-profile, select-screen-profile.1: updated
    to collapse ~/.screenrc-* into ~/.screen-profiles/*, LP: #335275
  * screen: added a hack to move ~/.screenrc-* into ~/.screen-profiles/*;
    this hack should be removed after Jaunty GA (only affects upgrading
    Alpha users), clear after screen exit (cleans up misleading status bar)
  * screen-launcher: drop santizer code; no longer necessary; handled by the
    screen wrapper, and screen patched to ignore missing sourced files.
  * bin/ec2-cost: speed up route with -n
  * screen-profiles.1: Add a note about PuTTY's odd key mapping for F1-F4,
    LP: #317550
  * keybindings/common, doc/help.txt: Change F5 from kill window to hot-reload
    profile (killing a window is easy enough, with 'exit' command)
  * profiles/*: provide other colored profiles

 -- Dustin Kirkland <email address hidden> Fri, 27 Feb 2009 16:20:41 -0600

Colin-

Per lunch discussion, could you take a look at putty's source for a more safe default?

:-Dustin

Colin,

I would like to work on this with you. I use putty-gtk2 on Ubuntu and also win32 (on win of course :) )

My setup uses function keys a lot for our unix based ERP system so I need to know how screen, ubuntu, and my app will function together,

Workaround with Xterm R6 keyboard mode not working for me with Windows 7 64-bit Enterprise and PuTTY 0.6.

Strange is that F2, F3, F4
* beep on the bash prompt and type nothing
* do correct job in mc (F2-user menu, F3-view, F4-edit)
* beep and to nothing in byobu

I tried in turn all PuTTY's keyboard modes without success.