Laurent Siebenmann writes:
 >
 >
 > Dear Colleagues,
 >
 > Here is a question about accessibility of ASCII characters
 > in **Russian** keyboards -- MS Windows for a start.
 > But DOS and unix too.
 >
 > While typing English, which of the following ASCII non-letter
 > characters are available on your keyboard in a simple
 > keystroke position, and which with modifier key(s) and which
 > only with extreme difficulty.
 >
 >    ! " # % & ' * / ()
 >    < = > @
 >    [ \ ] ^ _ `
 >    { | } ~
 >
 > I notice that on a French Windows keyboard, \ requires a
 > double modifier key!!!!! Also ` and ~ are *highly*
 > inaccessible (3 keystrokes each). In a generic editor here in
 > France, TeX is not well served by Wintel.

In common you can consider Russian keyboard the same as English:
we never use only 'Cyrillic' register; and in any case
we can easy switch to English. This due to Cyrillic alphabet
too differ from Latin, and no sense use key modifiers as in Europe
languages --- the common practice is switch to another language
register.

Hope this helps.

Best regards,

       - Petr