What you need to type to change the keyboard layout from "us" to "de" on CentOS, Fedora and similar Linux systems, when the actual keyboard has a German layout. There are quite a number of pages out there explaining what you need to *do*, but it's quite annoying to find the right keys to *type* while OS's keyboard layout does not match the actua…

change_keyboard_us_to_de.txt

# Lines beginning with # are not to be typed :-)

# Type this:
vi -etc-szsconfig-kezboard    # vi /etc/sysconfig/keyboard

# The file probably looks like this:
KEYBOARDTYPE="pc"
KEYTABLE="us"

# Now type this:
jllllllllll                   # navigates to the value of KEYTABLE

# You might also be able to use the arrow keys to navigate.
# However, the cursor should be over the u of "us" now.

R                             # enter REPLACE mode
de                            # change the value to de for German keyboard layout
<ESC>                         # press Escape to leave REPLACE mode
Öwq                           # translates to :wq (save and exit vi)
reboot

A reboot seems to be neccessary for the change to take effect. At least
I found no other possibility.

If you need to type more stuff with KEYTABLE="us",
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:KB_United_States-NoAltGr.svg
might help.

While you're at it, you might also want to edit /home/USERNAME/.bash_profile
and add the line 
export LANG=de