[conspire] help: linux scancode/keycode problem on Dell E6500 ?

[=JeffH]

 > Quoting =JeffH (Jeff.Hodges at KingsMountain.com):
 >
 >> Well it turns out I probably shudda queried the xorg at freedesktop.org
 >> list long ago because some folks there were on top of this problem
 >> and apparently my googling skills are lacking.
 >>
 >> Fn+F8 is now working on my E6500 and I've successfully migrated to
 >> it as my primary system (whew).
 >
 > Wow, as you said, blow me down.  Who'd have thought that OEMs would
 > sabotage the Fn key's sending function just because Microsoft Corp.
 > asked them to please make it send Windows ('super') key, instead.  I
 > wonder what these idiots would say if you asked them 'Excuse me, but how
 > do I make my E6500 with current firmware do what Fn+F8 used to do?'

well, their answer would undoubtedly be to run windows 7.  but i may pose that 
question in any case in their forums when  I get around to following up on my 
(unanswered) posts there.

 > You know, you don't need to have 'quiet' and 'splash' in there unless
 > you actually want them.  They interfere somewhat with being able to
 > observe and debug the booting process.

yeah, I know, thx.

 >> I'm curious though -- why can't this be solved by remapping keycodes,
 >> or down lower in the X stack ?
 >
 > It probably could be solve by remapping key scancodes.

yeah, that's what I've wondered all along in figuring this out, but haven't 
received any clear answers as yet (and I don't really want to have to learn 
about this, i have other irons in the fire(s)).

 >> Apparently the gnome folk have resorted to putting a fix into
 >> gnome-settings-daemon, which has the downside of breaking various
 >> users' keymappings for various applications.
 >
 > That's obviously a very wrong place in the software stack to fix key
 > mappings

agreed.


=JeffH