Can not get Hotkeys to work after update to KDE4

[Dan Johansson]

On Sunday 25 October 2009 10.59:56 Duncan wrote:
> Dan Johansson posted on Sun, 25 Oct 2009 10:56:03 +0200 as excerpted:
> > After updating from KDE3.5 to KDE4.3.1 I can not get my Hotkeys to work.
> > For example the following the following two Hotkeys
> >
> > 1) I want the <PrintScreen> button to start ksnapshot and I activated
> > the Printscreen action in
> > System Settings -> Input Actions -> Preset Action -> Printscreen.
> >
> > 2) I want to start dolphin when I press Win+E, and have defined an
> > action in
> > System Settings -> Input Actions -> DJ -> Dolphin when pressing Win+E
> >
> > But non of these works. Nothings happens when I press the keys.
> >
> > Here is some output from xev when pressing PrintScreen and then Win+E
> 
> [snip xev output... the keys are indeed sensed correctly]
> 
> Hotkeys in kde4 are a bit of a mess.  First, the upgrade doesn't seem to
> go quite right, leaving actions that appear to be registered but don't
> work as they should (or at least that was the case here, and seems to be
> what happened to you as well).  Second and the big issue for me,
> multi-key hotkeys (such as: Win-X, E, aka Meta-E or for those with
> internet/multimedia keyboards with lots of "extra" keys, XF86WWW, E)
> don't work in kde4 (but simple modifier plus normal key should work, so
> for instance, Win-E, aka Meta-E).
> 
> That said, the keys you mention /should/ work.  It's just that the
> configuration is a bit unintuitive, now, especially with the migrated
> keys that don't migrate...
> 
> Here's what I had to do.  If you have a whole list of key settings, you
> may wish to write them down elsewhere (on paper or in a normal text file
> or something) to reenter, later.  Then all those preset actions... those
> are the migrations from kde3 that don't seem to work at all, or at least
> they didn't, here.  Delete them.  (If you wish, you can try unchecking
> the preset actions checkbox, hitting OK, restarting kde just to be sure,
> and checking it again then hitting OK, and restarting kde again, but that
> didn't seem to do much here, altho that may be because many of mine were
> multi-key, which as I said, don't work correctly in kde4 anyway.  I ended
> up just deleting that whole set.)
> 
> Now, under keyboard and mouse, there's two separate sets of keyboard
> actions configuration.  It's a bit hard to keep the three different
> locations straight, but Standard Keyboard Shortcuts are the default per-
> application settings.  Thus, if you change a setting here, it'll change
> it in any kde app that has that action.  That's /not/ the one we want.
> 
> The other settings applet is Global keyboard shortcuts.  These are
> actions that sort of apply to a single app, but they'll be sensed and
> applied regardless of what app you happen to be in when you use the
> shortcut.  This is where we want to set things up, and/or check and
> perhaps remove some shortcuts.
> 
> In Global keyboard shortcuts, under kwin, there's two settings of
> interest, Window Screenshot to Clipboard (which defaults to alt-print,
> but that's not particularly suitable, since alt activates the SysRq key
> on most x86 style keyboards, so alt-print never happens, because it's
> SysRq instead), and Desktop screenshot to clipboard (which defaults to
> Ctrl-Printscrn).  Depending on your preferences, these two MAY be
> sufficient for you, such that you don't need ksnapshot after all.  If you
> want ksnapshot, you'll set that elsewhere, and will probably want to
> delete these two default entries.  If these suffice, you'll probably want
> to change the Window screenshot to clipboard to something else, I used
> meta-print (aka win-print), for the reasons outlined above.  Note that I
> don't have anything assigned to simply print, as I want it a bit less
> easy to trigger by accident than that, but YMMV.
> 
> Once you get that set to your preferences and applied/OKed, you can move
> on to setting the app trigger keys.  There's two ways you can do this.
> One is to set them up basically manually, as direct Input Actions.  The
> second is to set them up as shortcuts to the applications as they appear
> in kickoff/kmenu/lancelot.
> 
> We'll take the second way first.  Right click on the menu (kmenu/lancelot/
> kickoff/whatever) icon and select Menu Editor.  Find the application
> entry you wish to have a shortcut, click on the advanced tab, and set the
> shortcut key as appropriate.  If you want to setup shortcuts for multiple
> apps, you can do so.  Of course you can make more major changes to your
> menu here if desired as well, adding entries, moving them around, etc.
> When you are done, don't forget to hit Save, to apply your changes.

This did it, my shortcuts are now working (:-)

> Now, back to Input Actions in system settings.  This is the one you were
> in first, NOT either of the keyboard shortcut applets.  You should have a
> kmenuedit entry there now.  Make sure it's checked to activate.  You can
> expand the list and activate/deactivate individual entries as well, if
> you like.  Hit OK.  At this point it's probably a good idea to restart
> kde again, just to be sure the settings take.

Yepp, my shortcuts are there!

> The other alternative is to setup the app triggers as direct input
> actions.  This you'd do in Input Actions.  I'd suggest creating your own
> group, labeled with your initials or something, so kde doesn't try to
> mess with it in future upgrades and you know it's your customized
> actions.  Make sure it's enabled.  Right click on it and choose new,
> global shortcut, command/url.  Type in the name of the action, probably
> the name of the program you wish to start.  The trigger tab should be
> active.  Add the shortcut you want.  Click on the action tab, and enter
> the name of the command you wish to launch, along with any additional
> parameters.  If you wish, you can add a comment on that tab, as well.
> Repeat this for additonal actions as necessary.  When you are done, don't
> forget to apply the changes.

For some reason this does not work for me, no big problem at the moment as the 
method of setting the shortcuts in kmenuedit works.

> Whichever application trigger method you chose, kmenuedit or manual
> entry, you can set Win-E for Dolphin.  Whether you set PrintScr for
> ksnapshot or use the kwin desktop and window screenshot to clipboard
> functions is up to you, but if you chose the ksnapshot way, once you
> disabled the kwin global shortcuts if desired, you'd set the ksnapshot
> launcher trigger just as you would any other launcher trigger, using
> either the kmenuedit or manual entry method described above.

Thanks Duncan for your input.

-- 
Dan Johansson, <http://www.dmj.nu>
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