<solved more or less> CapsLock & .Xmodmap headaches

[sadhu]

On my laptop, i have the following .Xmodmap stored in ~/.local/share:

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keycode 58 = Shift_L Caps_Lock NoSymbol NoSymbol
pointer = 1 0 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

It works:

• Line 1 causes CapsLock to act as the Shift key, and Shift-CapsLock actually toggles the CapsLock function
• Line 2 disables the middle mouse button, which prevents me from pasting when I scroll through a long document.

It's when I get back to my desktop that problems arise. First, the mouse middle button is disabled, so therefore .Xmodmap is being read. However, I can't seem to get the caps lock to switch.

I'm using a Logitech K120 (standard US) keyboard. Showkeys yields

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keycode  58 press
keycode  58 release

Moreover, neither of the 2nd or 3rd selections on System Settings > Keyboard > Layouts > Options see to work: "Caps Lock acts as Shift with Locking..." I would like the third setting, where Shift pauses the caps lock function. But neither of these work. Bug?

I have two questions:

1) What must I do to get .Xmodmap to work?
2) Where can I find documentation for ALL of these selections on Keyboard Layout Options? Some of the others seem intriguing. (I hate experimenting; I'd rather just read the manual.)


Thanks

Sadhu

[deepakdeshp]

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man xmodmap

gives the manual for this utility. Similarly you can see man for the utilities at the see also section at the bottom of the man page

[sadhu]

Code: Select all

man xmodmap

gives the manual for this utility. Similarly you can see man for the utilities at the see also section at the bottom of the man page

Yes, thanks, that helps for xmodmap. As it is, I used the command xmodmap -pke to a list of keys, and it turns out Caps_Lock is key 66, not 58 as shown by sudo showkey. After editing .Xmodmap as follows

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keycode  66 = Shift_L Caps_Lock NoSymbol Caps_Lock
pointer = 1 0 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

then running sudo xmodmap .Xmodmap, everything's working properly.

But the other questions remain: Where can I find a discussion about the keyboard layout options in the System Properties? Why did I have to edit .Xmodmap instead of just selecting items 2 or 3 on the Keyboard Layout Options window?

I'll mark it solved when I get answers to those two questions. ---because for a newbie or non-Linux guru, clicking checkboxes is much easier than playing around with xmodmap.

Thanks,

-Sadhu

[deepakdeshp]

This may help.
In a shell:

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man keyboard
sudo dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration