The \fBSDL_keysym\fR structure is used by reporting key presses and releases since it is a part of the \fI\fBSDL_KeyboardEvent\fR\fR\&.
.PP
The \fBscancode\fR field should generally be left alone, it is the hardware dependent scancode returned by the keyboard\&. The \fBsym\fR field is extremely useful\&. It is the SDL-defined value of the key (see \fISDL Key Syms\fR\&. This field is very useful when you are checking for certain key presses, like so:
.PP
.nf
\f(CW\&.
\&.
while(SDL_PollEvent(&event)){
switch(event\&.type){
case SDL_KEYDOWN:
if(event\&.key\&.keysym\&.sym==SDLK_LEFT)
move_left();
break;
\&.
\&.
\&.
}
}
\&.
\&.\fR
.fi
.PP
\fBmod\fR stores the current state of the keyboard modifiers as explained in \fI\fBSDL_GetModState\fP\fR\&. The \fBunicode\fR is only used when UNICODE translation is enabled with \fI\fBSDL_EnableUNICODE\fP\fR\&. If \fBunicode\fR is non-zero then this a the UNICODE character corresponding to the keypress\&. If the high 9 bits of the character are 0, then this maps to the equivalent ASCII character:
.PP
.nf
\f(CWchar ch;
if ( (keysym\&.unicode & 0xFF80) == 0 ) {
ch = keysym\&.unicode & 0x7F;
}
else {
printf("An International Character\&.
");
}\fR
.fi
.PP
UNICODE translation does have a slight overhead so don\&'t enable it unless its needed\&.
