actually i have spent so much time doing things with 2.x that i never got back to trying to use the keymap to see if it fixed the issue with dosbox. before (in 1.x) i did not have to use a keymap for qemu or dosbox because i use a us keyboard. in qemu the solution is very simple, add "-k en-us" to the already lengthy list of parameters typical of qemu use- so i've been using qemu with no problem.
i don't use dosbox as often so it didn't come up again. based on this thread i wonder if dosbox is fixable. i believe though, it is. besides i have enough things to worry about without assuming that dosbox is unfixable until i try.