[gentoo-user] EMERGENCY: X11 KEYBOARD MAPPING STOPPED WORKING!!!!

[Alan Grimes]

having extreme trouble typing this, haven't had to type qwerty in
fifteen years, keyboard mapping I need went poof during recent update,
rebooted for kernel 6.3,

X11 is NOT recording logs to /var/log since last year.  Console seemed
to be barfing about not knowing what a dvorak is even though it is the
only other ISO standard keyboard mapping. No way to access console barf
from within X11, no idea where logs are if they exist.

here are my configs,  2010 version has:
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Mar  7  2020 xorg.conf.d
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2490 Oct 21  2010 xorg.conf.good

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "kbd"
    Option         "XkbLayout" "dvorak"
EndSection

Since that was too simple and made too much sense, they had to make it
uglier...
current active config:

Section "InputClass"
    Identifier         "keyboard-layout"
    MatchIsKeyboard    "on"
    Option         "XkbLayout" "dvorak"
    Option         "XkbModel" "pc104"
#        Option "XkbOptions" "grp:caps_toggle"
EndSection


***@tortoise ~ $ setxkbmap
Error loading new keyboard description
***@tortoise ~ $

still have package              x11-apps/xinput-1.6.3    installed even
tho eclean-dist wants it gone, must be error because no clue how x11 is
supposed to work without it. =(

Yet agan Linux manufactures a new insoluble problem without warning and
for no reason.

[Michael]

Post by Alan Grimes
having extreme trouble typing this, haven't had to type qwerty in
fifteen years, keyboard mapping I need went poof during recent update,
rebooted for kernel 6.3,
X11 is NOT recording logs to /var/log since last year. Console seemed
to be barfing about not knowing what a dvorak is even though it is the
only other ISO standard keyboard mapping.

In a consile you could try:

# loadkeys dvorak

Post by Alan Grimes
No way to access console barf
from within X11, no idea where logs are if they exist.

I think console related logs will be in your syslog or dmesg, if this involves
errors from interaction with the kernel. Not sure anything else would be
recorded by default.

If you use ssdm as a DM look for ~/.local/share/sddm/xorg-session.log for X
session logs.

Post by Alan Grimes
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Mar 7 2020 xorg.conf.d
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2490 Oct 21 2010 xorg.conf.good
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver "kbd"
Option "XkbLayout" "dvorak"
EndSection
Since that was too simple and made too much sense, they had to make it
uglier...
Section "InputClass"
Identifier "keyboard-layout"
MatchIsKeyboard "on"
Option "XkbLayout" "dvorak"
Option "XkbModel" "pc104"
# Option "XkbOptions" "grp:caps_toggle"
EndSection
Error loading new keyboard description

Try this:

$ setxkbmap -print -verbose 10

Post by Alan Grimes
still have package x11-apps/xinput-1.6.3 installed even
tho eclean-dist wants it gone, must be error because no clue how x11 is
supposed to work without it. =(

There was a news item three years ago about this change:

https://www.gentoo.org/support/news-items/2020-04-03-deprecation-of-legacy-x11-input-drivers.html

Try to set your keyboard layout manually to minimise typing errors:

setxkbmap -layout us -variant ,dvorak

Set in your make.conf:

INPUT_DEVICES="libinput"

Then run:

emerge -uaNDv --with-bdeps=y @world
emerge --depclean -v -a
revdep-rebuild -v -- -a

to bring your packages up to date.

Finally, revisit your xorg.conf, these days the configuration is in seperate
files under /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/40-libinput.conf. Something like this ought
to work:

Section "InputClass"
Identifier "libinput keyboard catchall"
MatchIsKeyboard "on"
MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*"
Driver "libinput"
Option "XkbLayout" "us"
Option "XkbVariant" ",dvorak"
Option "XkbOptions" "terminate:ctrl_alt_bksp"
EndSection

[Alan Grimes]

I need a way to get X11 to boot into dvorak layout mode without having
to look up this e-mail to find the command to set the layout to dvorak.

My current xorg.conf has: but does not do anything useful.

Section "InputDevice"
   # generated from default
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "keyboard"
        Option "XkbLayout" "us"
        Option "XkbVariant" "dvorak"
EndSection

setxkbmap -layout us -variant dvorak

[Jigme Datse]

On Wed, 5 Jul 2023 16:42:15 -0400

Post by Alan Grimes
I need a way to get X11 to boot into dvorak layout mode without
having to look up this e-mail to find the command to set the layout
to dvorak.
My current xorg.conf has: but does not do anything useful.
Section "InputDevice"
   # generated from default
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "keyboard"
        Option "XkbLayout" "us"
        Option "XkbVariant" "dvorak"
EndSection

setxkbmap -layout us -variant dvorak

Part of why I stepped away from the Dvorak layout. US layout would
always, "just work". Like there were times when I'd have to type
something when it was interpreted as US layout... But...

Would putting that command in your ~/.xinitirc or some equivalent work?
It kind of would be nice if it could be done in the xorg.conf I do
agree.

[Andreas Fink]

On Wed, 5 Jul 2023 16:42:15 -0400

Post by Alan Grimes
I need a way to get X11 to boot into dvorak layout mode without having
to look up this e-mail to find the command to set the layout to dvorak.
My current xorg.conf has: but does not do anything useful.
Section "InputDevice"
   # generated from default
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "keyboard"
        Option "XkbLayout" "us"
        Option "XkbVariant" "dvorak"
EndSection

setxkbmap -layout us -variant dvorak

I have this in my config file:
Section "InputClass"
Identifier "Keyboard"
Driver "libinput"
MatchIsKeyboard "on"
Option "xkbmodel" "evdev"
Option "xkblayout" "us"
Option "xkbvariant" "altgr-intl"
Option "xkbrules" "evdev"
Option "xkboptions" "nodeadkeys"
EndSection

Maybe it helps.