Cannot type quotation marks or carets (', ", ^)

My system runs on Ubuntu 22.04.2 LTS and I have no problem whatsoever with typing these special characters in any application other than Matlab. Only my Matlab installation (version R2022b) refuses to let me type quotation marks and carets.

I've checked Matlab's preferences and there don't seem to be any settings that influence this. I've tried different keyboard layouts, the English (US, alt. intl.) and English (US, intl., with dead keys) but this doesn't change anything.

[Matt J]

Do you get a blank character at the command line when you try to type one of these characters? What happens if you attempt to execute a simple command with a caret, e.g.,

2^2

ans = 4

[Rick de Wolf]

Yes, I get a blank character that seems to be a space.

I can execute commands containing carets and quotation marks just fine if I copy-paste them into Matlab. They are displayed just like you would expect them to be displayed as well, so the problem is really just the typing of the characters.

[Matt J]

But what happens when you try to type in and execute 2^2 at the command line. Does it produce an error message? Maybe the caret is just hidden for some reason.

[Rick de Wolf]

@Matt J what happens is the same thing as what happens in the editor. When I try to type the characters all I get is a blank space. When I copy-paste the characters I see them exactly the way I should, and the code executes just fine too.

@Cris LaPierre thanks, I found that post after I'd posted my question. I'm using that workaround at the moment, but I really hope that there's an actual fix out there.

Answer 1

[Cris LaPierre]

By any chance, are you using an international keyboard? Here's a related thread with at least one potential workaround.

https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/1933955-cannot-type-symbols-on-dead-keys-e-g-to-write-or#answer_1223399