At http://www.catb.org/esr/jargon/html/M/meta-bit.html it is written
meta bit: n. The top bit of an 8-bit character, which is on in character values 128--255. Also called high bit, alt bit. Some terminals and consoles (see space-cadet keyboard) have a META shift key. [...] -------- That's probably why readline regards "\M-" as setting the meta bit, i.e. the 8th bit. This could be useful with the ASCII charset, where the 8th bit could be stripped by the terminal and interpreted in some special way (e.g. "\M-" commands), but this no longer makes any sense with true characters having the 8th bit set. -- Vincent Lefèvre <vinc...@vinc17.net> - Web: <https://www.vinc17.net/> 100% accessible validated (X)HTML - Blog: <https://www.vinc17.net/blog/> Work: CR INRIA - computer arithmetic / AriC project (LIP, ENS-Lyon)
