How to set up the native Win95/98/Me keyboard driver for KOI8-R

This instructions are second part of the KOI8-R adding process, be shure you not miss first one.

NOTE: The Polish language was chosen in the examples below, but any Central European language can be chosen instead to associate this keyboard driver with the hacked Central European code page. See hack description for details.

For all Win95/98/Me Editions:

Copy this KOI8-R keyboard map to the \Windows\System directory.

NOTE: The keyboard map was created in Janko's Keyboard Generator, and you can even modify it further using this tool. Microsoft doesn't bother to provide a keyboard editor for us, but now we have the solution! I've even replaced the standard Microsoft Russian (CP1251) keyboard with a JKbd95-generated one because of the very strange Microsoft's assumptions about some characters' places.

For those who don't have a keyboard with standard Russian keymarks, here is phonemic keyboard map (German-like).

See also Notes on the Cp_20866.nls resource (for programmers).

For any Win95/98/Me non-Russian Edition:

1. Apply this Registry addition (this can be done from command line: Regedit.exe koi8-kbd.reg) to add KOI8-R keyboard to the list of valid keyboards.
2. Select Control Panel|Keyboard|Language|Add and add Polish language.
3. Select the language and click Properties, then choose Russian (KOI8-R) in Keyboard Layout menu. Finally, you must have the following settings in the Installed keyboard languages and layouts table:

   En English (United States)       United States Pl Polish Russian (KOI8-R) Ru Russian Russian

4. Turn on the Enable indicator on taskbar checkbox and choose one of the Switch languages methods.
5. Don't forget to reboot the system.

For Win95/98/Me Russian Edition:

1. Apply this Registry addition (this can be done from command line: Regedit.exe koi8rkbd.reg) to add KOI8-R keyboard to the list of valid keyboards.
2. Select Панель управления|Клавиатура|Язык|Добавить... and add Польский language.
3. Select the language and click Свойства, then choose Русская (KOI8-R) in the Раскладка menu. Finally, you must have the following settings in the Установленные языки и раскладки клавиатуры table:

   En Английский (США)              США Pl Польский Русская (KOI8-R) Ru Русский Русская

4. Turn on the Вывести индикатор checkbox and choose one of the Сочетания клавиш для переключения раскладки methods.
5. Don't forget to reboot the system.

KNOWN PROBLEMS: Win95 native keyboard switch method has serious problems as designed. The problem list:

1. Win95 implements per-application keyboard switcher, not for all applications at once.
2. Sometimes hot key switching just does not work. You can use menu (from the taskbar tray icon, En - Ru - Pl) or temporary go to another window (in the same program), switch there and go back. Usually, if you open a Help|About... window and switch there, it is enough.
3. If your keyboard gets stuck after switching to Russian mode, you need to temporarily go to the parent window and return.
4. If you can't reenter Russian mode again in the current window, you need to temporarily go to the parent window, switch to Russian mode there and return. If this doesn't help, open yet another window in the same program and try to switch keyboard there, then return to the original window.

Special thanx to Janko Stamenovic' <janko@eunet.yu> for his Keyboard Generator.

See also Notes on the Cp_20866.nls resource (for programmers) and How to properly set up Win95/98/Me for KOI8-R.