[PLUG] Connect BT keyboard to headless Raspberry Pi?

[Eric House]

Looking to build a portable linux environment that'll run on
airplane's USB power I'm playing with a Raspberry Pi, an iPad and a
bluetooth keyboard. I run a Bluetooth PAN network on the Pi, ssh into
it from the iPad using a terminal app, and connect the keyboard to the
iPad so I can actually type.

It works pretty well until I fire up emacs. A number of critical key
combinations turn out to be captured by iOS. For example, some genius
imagined that ctrl-spacebar ought to pop up an emoji picker no matter
what app is in use.

So I'm wondering: could I connect the keyboard to the Pi instead of
the iPad? I could start screen in my ssh session from the iPad, then
(after some keyboard magic) run 'screen -x' in the keyboard's session
so that my typing would then go into the same screen the iPad was
displaying. I'm quickly realizing I don't understand Linux very well
at this level: don't even know how to frame the question!

Does this sound possible? What are the parts I'd need to configure? It
kinda works if the pi has a monitor connected and virtual consoles are
available. I haven't had any luck if it's headless, but then I don't know
quite where to look.

(Yeah, I could get a new laptop that'd have a chance of lasting a
flight or charge off USB. I'm shopping -- but there aren't many
small/light 32G laptops with decent battery life and no
touchscreen. Meanwhile, this is fun.)

Thanks,

--Eric