Bug 61792

Summary: Support for extra and/or special keys on modern keyboards
Product: [Unmaintained] kdelibs Reporter: raspl
Component: generalAssignee: Stephan Kulow <coolo>
Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME    
Severity: wishlist CC: l.lunak, lure
Priority: NOR    
Version First Reported In: unspecified   
Target Milestone: ---   
Platform: openSUSE   
OS: Linux   
Latest Commit: Version Fixed/Implemented In:
Sentry Crash Report:

Description raspl 2003-07-29 08:19:00 UTC 
Version:            (using KDE KDE 3.1.2)
Installed from:    SuSE RPMs

Recently set out to buy a new keyboard. It appears to be impossible to get one without a set of extra keys. I didn't like these at first, but once I got it, I wanted to use those extra keys as well, of course.
Now there are two major problems in this area:
First off, you have to set up those keys (start xev, write down the keycodes and adjust your xmodmap). This is rather painful though not that hard. I would like to see a possibility in KDE to automate that. Could be a program which says 'press new key NOW'. After pressing it, it will check in xmodmap if the key is already assigned, and if not, offers a possibility to do so (usually assigning it to F13, F14, etc.)
The other, more serious issue is that once you have those keys available, assigning functionality to them is a real pain: You have to use the menu editor (and I know a number of people who needed hours to find out that keys are assigned there!) and have to create a menu entry for everything that you want to assign to a special key. That process in itself is not very good for this task (a separate application seems to be badly needed), but is also VERY limited in this context: Those keyboards have keys with symbolds for specific things like shutting down, increasing/decreasing volume, etc. The entry for logging off from KDE does not even appear in the menu editor, so I cannot assign it to a key. I found samples on the web which showed how to edit the respective resource files to assign in-/decreasing volume to some keys, but that is not a good solution.
So my proposal would be to either at least make some additional menu entries like logging off, activating screensaver, etc. available in the menu editor as well, so one can assign special keys to them.
Or create a new configuration app that can be used to configure the keyboard's special keys and assign functionality to them, with some very common things like screensaver (=screen locking), logoff, decrease/increase volume, etc. readily available.
Comment 1 Thiago Macieira 2003-07-29 13:15:06 UTC 
This is not a KDE setting. Your X server should already contain the proper keymaps for 
those keys. Mine includes already the standard ACPI buttons (Power, Sleep and WakeUp) 
as well as several combinations of "Internet" keyboards, with keys like back, forward, 
home, etc. 
 
Just use kxkb (kcmlayout in Control Center) and set your keyboard properly. It must be 
currently set to 105 keys -- just choose one that has all your keys.
Comment 2 raspl 2003-07-29 14:06:30 UTC 
Sorry, but that does not quite cut it. For one, there will always be newer
keyboards out there that are not yet supported. But you can argue that that is
an issue of X, and though I think that would be a bad argument, since 'normal'
users don't know much about X, I can't say much against that.
But the whole issue with assigning _proper_ events like system shutdown,
screenlock, volumen control, etc. is not adressed at all. We would need a
solution where one can assign these to whatever key he likes. And I don't quite
see that: Those events are simply not available or thought of anywhere!
Comment 3 Stephan Kulow 2023-02-27 08:05:19 UTC 
I can connect any special key I have on my keyboard to an action.