problems with microsoft natural ergonomic keyboard 4000

[trantorvega]

For the possessors of the Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000:

I wrote this howto with informations to get ALL the keys recognised by X, along with custom XKB files.

http://gentoo-wiki.com/index.php?title= ... board_4000

Comments are welcome.

[powerman]

Comments are welcome.

It sounds much more complex than using my patch. But maybe your way will be more compatible with Nek4K driver included in kernel in the future, don't sure.

Anyway, I suggest you create patch with all proposed changes in Xorg files and post it instead of these complex instructions.

[trantorvega]

Thanks for your suggestions.
If you have others you may use the discussion feature of the wiki.
Finding this thread was pretty difficult, and is not so visible (the search functionality of this forum is what i like the least).
I agree about the creation of a comprehensive patch, in fact I intended to include it in the near future, but only as an addtion to the detailed explanation: the latter gives more insight on thw workings of the xkb files, and leaves room for future and autonomous modifications by the users.
Moreover, a detailed description is something you find far less often than a patch.
About your patch, I agree that it is far simpler. (If I've found it sooner I might have choosed it ).
liyu's work is interesting in providing a sort of interface to esìasily implement several devices, and I like the idea of having a separate module to manage the extended features of the nek4k.
I have only a suggestion: I believe you should put the F-Lock portion of your patch into a separate patch, considering that the F-lock keys removal is not by far, something that everyone might desire (I don't, for instance) along with the recognition of the additional keys.
I'll add a link to your patch in the immediate future.

[JohnerH]

Hey,

I've been trying to go through the patches on the WIKI but they don't seem to work with the latest 2.6.20 versions of the kernel, is anyone still looking at getting this keyboard working?

Thanks in advance,

J

[powerman]

I've been trying to go through the patches on the WIKI but they don't seem to work with the latest 2.6.20 versions of the kernel, is anyone still looking at getting this keyboard working?

I'll update my patch as soon as Gentoo devs will release/make stable hardened-sources 2.6.19+ (right now I still use 2.6.16 because some of my 'too modern' hardware work correctly only with 2.6.16 and then 2.6.19 (both 2.6.17 and 2.6.18 has buggy driver for my JMicron IDE controller while 2.6.16 is working mostly ok with "all-generic-ide irqpoll" kernel params).

BTW, is this keyboard still doesn't supported by Linux 2.6.20 without any patches?!

[JohnerH]

I've been trying to go through the patches on the WIKI but they don't seem to work with the latest 2.6.20 versions of the kernel, is anyone still looking at getting this keyboard working?

I'll update my patch as soon as Gentoo devs will release/make stable hardened-sources 2.6.19+ (right now I still use 2.6.16 because some of my 'too modern' hardware work correctly only with 2.6.16 and then 2.6.19 (both 2.6.17 and 2.6.18 has buggy driver for my JMicron IDE controller while 2.6.16 is working mostly ok with "all-generic-ide irqpoll" kernel params).

BTW, is this keyboard still doesn't supported by Linux 2.6.20 without any patches?!

Afraid not...

You fancy summiting it to the kernel devs?

Couldn't hurt...

J

P.S.: I'd do it but I'm scared of getting barked at

[Richy]

Hey,
I have found a Patch for 2.6.21-r2

http://lwn.net/Articles/224659/
(for future reference )

Edit:

I got it working for 2.6.19 except for one (important) key. It is the "< | >" Key...
Any Idea on that?

Richy

[Richy]

Hey,

I found a Solution for myself:

Code: Select all

File: ~.Xmodmap                                    

add Mod4 = Super_L
keycode 94 = less greater brokenbar
keycode 108 = ISO_Level3_Shift
keycode 135 = Mode_switch

I get the brokenbar by pressing the "menu" key and the usual..

Richy

[JohnerH]

Hey,

I found a Solution for myself:

Code: Select all

File: ~.Xmodmap                                    

add Mod4 = Super_L
keycode 94 = less greater brokenbar
keycode 108 = ISO_Level3_Shift
keycode 135 = Mode_switch

I get the brokenbar by pressing the "menu" key and the usual..

Richy

So what does this do exactly?

Hey,
I have found a Patch for 2.6.21-r2

http://lwn.net/Articles/224659/
(for future reference )

For some reason it's not letting me patch.....I'm on linux-2.6.21-gentoo-sources...

Any ideas?

[Richy]

hey JohnerH,

The Xmodmap file gets automatically loaded when starting X.
Using the "xev" command, i was able to find out, which keycodes are sent by the keys.
The key with "<>|" on it send keycode 94
Therefore:

"keycode 94 = less greater bar "

man Xmodmap

Code: Select all

 keycode NUMBER = KEYSYMNAME ...[...]
 The first keysym is used when
               no modifier key is pressed in conjunction with  this  key,  the
               second  with  Shift, the third when the Mode_switch key is used
               with this key and the fourth  when  both  the  Mode_switch  and
               Shift keys are used

For some reason though, the "Alt GR"-key did send some ISO-3Shift signal. Because of that, the bar was not working. If I just assigned Mode_switch to it, the bar would work fine, but other special signs such as "@€~" would not show up anymore. As a workaround, I assigned "keycode 135 = Mode_switch", which is the menu-key right next to the "Alt GR"key.(I have never used the menu key before, so i figured...)
That's not really "the" way to go, but it works for me...

Referring to your patching problem:
No, I'm sorry. I haven't tried 2.6.21 myself, yet.. (and I'm not even close to being familiar with kernel-hacking)..
However, do you get any output? Usually Linux tells me what's wrong, and sometimes even how to fix it

Richy

[powerman]

2.6.20-hardened-r2 become stable, so I've updated my patch for this kernel. You can download it from http://powerman.asdfgroup.com/RTFM/kernel.html

[powerman]

I have only a suggestion: I believe you should put the F-Lock portion of your patch into a separate patch, considering that the F-lock keys removal is not by far, something that everyone might desire (I don't, for instance) along with the recognition of the additional keys.
I'll add a link to your patch in the immediate future.

Good idea, but I forget about it. Anyway, removing F-Lock portion of code from patch should be straightforward - just remove block of code under comment "Convert FLock's F-keys to normal F-keys".

I'd like to remove this code at all instead of just splitting one patch to two patches - is anybody know how to ignore F-Lock state without patching kernel? Solution described here don't work for me: http://www.linuxquestions.org/linux/ans ... on_Key_Fix

[Richy]

Good Morning,

Xorg 7.2 became stable and I updated to it yesterday. As of today, many keys aren't functioning right anymore! For some reason, keycodes have changed. (For example, the enter key on the numbertab is signalizing key 104 (the Down Key)..
I guess I have to adjust Xmodmap a lot, but still: What is the reason for that?

Richy


Edit:

Code: Select all

File: .Xmodmap                                    

add Mod4 = Super_L
keycode 94 = less greater bar
keycode 105 = Control_R
keycode 104 = KP_Enter
keycode 106 = KP_Divide
keycode 108 = ISO_Level3_Shift
keycode 110 = Home
keycode 111 = Up
keycode 112 = Prior
keycode 113 = Left
keycode 114 = Right
keycode 115 = End
keycode 116 = Down
keycode 117 = Next
keycode 118 = Insert
keycode 119 = Delete
keycode 133 = Super_L
keycode 135 = Mode_switch

[powerman]

I'm using 7.2 too. No problems, no xmodmap. Here is how both Enter's work:

KeyPress event, serial 29, synthetic NO, window 0x4000001,
root 0x63, subw 0x0, time 144635788, (103,258), root:(318,498),
state 0x0, keycode 36 (keysym 0xff0d, Return), same_screen YES,
" XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (0d) "
" XmbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (0d) "
XFilterEvent returns: False

KeyRelease event, serial 29, synthetic NO, window 0x4000001,
root 0x63, subw 0x0, time 144636036, (103,258), root:(318,498),
state 0x0, keycode 36 (keysym 0xff0d, Return), same_screen YES,
" XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (0d) "
XFilterEvent returns: False

KeyPress event, serial 29, synthetic NO, window 0x4000001,
root 0x63, subw 0x0, time 144640212, (103,258), root:(318,498),
state 0x0, keycode 108 (keysym 0xff8d, KP_Enter), same_screen YES,
" XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (0d) "
" XmbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (0d) "
XFilterEvent returns: False

KeyRelease event, serial 29, synthetic NO, window 0x4000001,
root 0x63, subw 0x0, time 144640532, (103,258), root:(318,498),
state 0x0, keycode 108 (keysym 0xff8d, KP_Enter), same_screen YES,
" XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (0d) "
XFilterEvent returns: False

[Richy]

Hey Powerman,

I get a different Keycode for the KP_Enter, it's 104 instead of 108. Maybe I messed something up, a long long time ago following the wiki and changing some Keyboard-layouts.
Using Xmodmap solves the problem for me. (Unfortunately I'm not skilled enough to find "the" Solution)

Richy

[derbrain]

Hello powerman,
I bought this keyboard last week, too. I first tried to follow the HOWTO, but there were some issues with udev (the udev-rule didn't work). Then I saw that you just updated your driver, and I decided to use that one. But I have some problems with it (maybe because I altered all the config files mentioned in the HOWTO). The numlock-led now is on when numlock is off, and the caps-lock led doesn't work at all. I will change the config files back to the original, probably it will work again after that. The special keys don't work for me. What do I have to do in addition to patch the kernel with your driver?
I found out that there is a new all-in-one hid friver from LiYu now, version 0.5 (dunno if there is a even newer one now, since I didn't find a central place to download the actual version from). What about that one? Do you have any idea which of the drivers will make it to be included in a future kernel?

[Richy]

Hi,
here is an update for 2.6.21
http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/4/30/33

It's working just fine under suspend2-sources-2.6.21-r4

Richy

[Sedrik]

Any news on this for the latest gentoo-sources, just recieved my keyboard today and would love to get it working =)

[Richy]

http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/7/16/122

[Ant P.]

I know it's a two year old thread, but I got one of these today and I'm having problems getting the zoom slider wheel to work. I can see a /dev/input/ file for it which seems to respond, but I can't use it in X. Besides that, a few of the F-Lock keys don't function (they seem to be reporting keycodes above 255 which IIRC X doesn't yet support...)

In Xorg.0.log it apparently does see the scroll wheel, but gives an error message:

Code: Select all

(**) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: always reports core events
(**) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Device: "/dev/input/event5"
(II) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Found 1 mouse buttons
(II) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Found scroll wheel(s)
(II) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Found keys
(II) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Configuring as keyboard
(II) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Adding scrollwheel support
(**) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: YAxisMapping: buttons 4 and 5
(**) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: EmulateWheelButton: 4, EmulateWheelInertia: 10, EmulateWheelTimeout: 200
(II) XINPUT: Adding extended input device "Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000" (type: KEYBOARD)
(**) Option "xkb_rules" "evdev"
(**) Option "xkb_model" "evdev"
(**) Option "xkb_layout" "gb"
(EE) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: failed to initialize for relative axes.
(II) config/hal: Adding input device Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000
(**) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: always reports core events
(**) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Device: "/dev/input/event4"
(II) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Found keys
(II) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: Configuring as keyboard

Anyone got this working?

[ilm]

From memory, you need to apply a patch to the kernel sources to get the zoom slider working (I've never bothered). It used to be on gentoo-wiki.com; if it's not there post-crash, try either gentoo-wiki.info or google's cache.

[Ant P.]

Hmm... looks like the kernel side of things already works fine. The zoom slider is reporting keycodes 418/419 according to showkey, X doesn't like them...

Code: Select all

(WW) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: unable to handle keycode 432
(WW) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: unable to handle keycode 419
(WW) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: unable to handle keycode 418

Looks like something that can be fixed easily enough with setkeycodes

[ppurka]

Hmm... looks like the kernel side of things already works fine. The zoom slider is reporting keycodes 418/419 according to showkey, X doesn't like them...

Code: Select all

(WW) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: unable to handle keycode 432
(WW) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: unable to handle keycode 419
(WW) Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000: unable to handle keycode 418

Looks like something that can be fixed easily enough with setkeycodes

Did you look here:
http://www.gentoo-wiki.info/HOWTO_Micro ... board_4000 ?

You need to scroll down to the "modern way of doing things" to come across the kernel patch which brings the keycodes down to less than 255.

[MageSlayer]

Hi

I'm trying to make my M$ Ergo 4000 keyboard disregard F-lock mode.
Preferably both under X and "true" console.

As far as understand, in theory everything is easy. I need to map keycodes/scancodes from disabled F-lock F-keys presses to ones keyboard generate when F-lock enabled.

So far so good. In practice, nothing is easy

To practice I tried to map unlocked F12 using xmodmap like following:

Code: Select all

denis@den-desktop ~ $ cat /home/denis/.Xmodmap 
keycode 218 = F12
denis@den-desktop ~ $ xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap 

Ok, now it seems like unlocked F12 behaves as locked F12. But...
Some apps see unlocked F12 normally, some don't.
e.g. Opera see F12 ok, tilda - does not.

Ok, I thought it's time to something more low-level. Like setkeycodes.
First I tried to find out scancode for unlocked F12. It's 0x39, AFAIU.

Code: Select all

den-desktop denis # LANG=C showkey -s
kb mode was RAW
[ if you are trying this under X, it might not work
since the X server is also reading /dev/console ]

press any key (program terminates 10s after last keypress)...
0x9c 
^[[24~^[[24~0xe0 0x39 
0xe0 0xb9 
^[[24~0xe0 0xb9 
^[[24~0xe0 0x39 
0xe0 0xb9 
^[[24~0xe0 0x39 
0xe0 0xb9 
0x3a 
^Ccaught signal 2, cleaning up...

Now I do :

Code: Select all

den-desktop denis # LANG=C setkeycodes e039 88

Nothing changed at all. Tilda still does not see unlocked F12.
Then I read in man setkeycodes:

BUGS
The keycodes of X have nothing to do with those of Linux. Unusual keys can be made visible under Linux, but not under X.

Does it mean nothing can be done? Not quite a clear comment

Guys. Help!

[ppurka]

To practice I tried to map unlocked F12 using xmodmap like following:

Code: Select all

denis@den-desktop ~ $ cat /home/denis/.Xmodmap 
keycode 218 = F12
denis@den-desktop ~ $ xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap 

Ok, now it seems like unlocked F12 behaves as locked F12. But...
Some apps see unlocked F12 normally, some don't.
e.g. Opera see F12 ok, tilda - does not.

Ok, I thought it's time to something more low-level. Like setkeycodes.

Only way to be sure is to launch xev and see what is the output of the keypress F12. If tilda doesn't work when (unlocked) F12 is pressed but xev shows that F12 is being sent, then it is a problem with tilda.

I thought setkeycodes was for setting keycodes for the console (Ctrl + Alt + F1, etc ). If my understanding is true, then it has nothing to do with X.