Thanks tor the advice but:
1. the SET INPUT works fine on the command line but doesn't work within an editor where I need to insert ? (cent) characters into my EXEC. x3270 doesn't offer a copy/paste option either.
2. I can't get x3270 to find my keymap file. I've tried giving the full path in the -keymap option of x3270 but it says not found even though a ls command with the same full path does find it. I can't locate the base keyap file that x3270 uses either. When I select the 'display current keymap'? menu option it says:
? ?Keymap 'base', from resource x3270.keymap.base'
The linux find command can't seem to find the resource either.??