Reload .Xresources without restarting the xterm

Question

To use ALT key in vim without tweaking, the escaping should be disabled in xterm. Without escaping the ALT will not work in bash for shortcuts.

to work around I need to reload this option before starting vim:

XTerm*metaSendsEscape: false | xrdb -load 

Any idea how I can reload .Xresource and make changes take effect without restarting the terminal window ?
Open to other terminal to have ALT work both in vim and bash.

Answer 1

xterm will not reread resources just because you run xrdb. X applications only read resources when they are initializing.

Besides the menu entry (added in patch #122, 1999), one could use two other ways to change the metaSendsEscape resource:

• escape sequence, documented in XTerm Control Sequences

  CSI ? Pm h DEC Private Mode Set (DECSET). ... Ps = 1 0 3 6 -> Send ESC when Meta modifies a key. (This enables the metaSendsEscape resource).

• editres (but very cumbersome due to the large number of resources)

Answer 2

This will reload the .Xresources:

xrdb ~/.Xresources

Source: Arch wiki

Answer 3

YAY, just checked, and XTerm has the option in its menu! I thought I saw it in there...

XTerm responds to each of left-, middle- (aka scrollwheel) and right-click with individual option menus when you're holding down the Ctrl key.

In your case, "Meta Sends Escape" is in the ctrl+left-click menu :)

Also, examining all three menus (if just to be aware of the options' existence) is a very good idea. I frequently use the font selector, for example.

Answer 4

Had to put xterm*metaSendsEscape: true into .Xdefaults, using .Xresources did not want to work for me under 16.04.

Followed up by a xrdb ~/.Xdefaults.