XKB Geometries
April 21, 2010 10:10 pm libgnomekbd, xkeyboard-configThere is one interesting request in bugzilla: using notification service for displaying CapsLock/NumLock/ScrollLock state change, for those wireless keyboard that do not have LEDs.
How would you distinguish – what keyboard needs that feature enabled? I guess it would be logical to check XKB geometry… I know, better than anyone, about the sorry state of the geometries now – but it can be improved, right?
April 22nd, 2010 at 12:47 am
I think there should be a setting somewhere for such notifications.
Wouldn’t be bad imho to have a notification on my laptop when capslock is pressed.
April 22nd, 2010 at 2:46 am
I don’t think you’re going to have much luck relying on the user having picked the right keyboard model. I think most people just leave it on the default.
If you did have a reliable way to find out what the user is looking for, you probably don’t want to use notifications, but instead the OSD things we use for volume, brightness, etc.
April 22nd, 2010 at 8:49 am
@Ray: that’s my whole point. I want to improve the situation with models and geometries. I want users to choose the correct models (and contribute more geometries). I want kbd stack to become smart enough to pick the correct XKB model based on the hardware data (HAL or smth).
April 22nd, 2010 at 2:46 pm
Erm, XKB already sends LED change events, regardless of the presence or otherwise of a physical LED.
April 22nd, 2010 at 4:20 pm
I would definitely like to see this type of feature in gnome. My wireless keyboard doesn’t have any of those lights and they are missed. It comes with software (for windows) to display these types of things on screen, however there is no linux FOSS equivalent that i know of.
April 22nd, 2010 at 5:11 pm
@daniels: yes I know. But the geometry can help to identify if the physical LED actually exists.