Keyboard shortcut disables touchpad and keyboard

English Hardware
1

I’ve discovered that pressing Fn + right arrow on OpenSUSE 12.2 (x64, KDE 4.10) disables my touchpad* and keyboard. Unfortunately, that same key combination changes the brightness of my keyboard’s backlight. I want to disable the touchpad/keyboard behavior of this key combination, however I can’t find any specific keyboard shortcut set in KDE’s system settings for this.

Also, as a side note, since discovering this problem for the first time, my touchpad doesn’t work when logged in to KDE anymore. When not logged in, everything works. Once I do, the touchpad stops working. Relogging fixes the keyboard, however.

Is there any way to prevent this key combination from disabling all input to the system (other than a USB mouse)? And getting my touchpad working again would be a plus.

*I get a KDE warning notification “The touchpad has been disabled”. It does not warn me about my keyboard, I discovered that on my own.

2

I can’t figure out how to edit my original post, so I’m putting this here.

If more specific information on my laptop is needed, it’s a relatively old Dell Stuido XPS 1340 with a Synaptics touchpad (don’t know the model). My linux kernel is 12.2’s standard 3.4.28-2.20. OpenSUSE lacks drivers for my keyboard backlight control, but the BIOS seems to handle this fine. Also, when I boot into Windows 7, my touchpad is restored to proper working order.

That’s all the information I have, I would appreciate any help. I will happily provide any system log files you ask for, etc.

3

I would hold off until openSUSE 12.3 is released next week on March 13th. It will have a more updated kernel 3.7x with KDE 4.10.
If you’re still having problems we’ll take it from there. Yes?

In the meantime take a look at Configure Desktop → Shortcuts and Gestures. This area shows all of the keyboard shortcuts that you have applied and saved. Sometimes due to error or neglect.

Look under the three sections

Check Custom Shortcuts.
Check Standard Keyboard Shortcuts

Check Global Keyboard Shortcuts. Then click on the “Default” button to bring everything back to the original settings.
Next, navigate to KDE component, click on the dropdown arrow and select KDE daemon. Click on Custom → None button. Assign your monitor brightness up combo and then click on the Apply button.
Repeat the same with monitor brightness down.

Grub2 Boot Loader
Start Yast -->System -->Boot Loader click on the** Boot Loader Options** Button. In the **Optional Kernel Command Line Parameter field add:
acpi_osi=Linux acpi_backlight=vendor
**
Click on the OK buttons and reboot your laptop.

4

Thank you. I’ll follow your suggestions as soon as I get a chance; I’m booted into Windows right now (for work).

I seem to remember Grub already having the acpi arguments on the kernel instruction already, but I know that KDE’s monitor brightness controls don’t work. The key-combination works because it’s going through BIOS (I think).

Thanks for the response. I’ll be ready to continue after 12.3 comes out, assuming there are no mishaps during upgrade.

5

You are welcome. Good Luck.

6

Well, I’ve got OpenSUSE 12.3 installed, and the Fn + right arrow still disables my touchpad and keyboard. Touchpad still doesn’t work when logged in. Adding the backlight options to grub made it so that my screen is at max brightness when I boot, but KDE still has no control over brightness.

I stand ready to provide an log files or command output that is needed to help figure this out.

7

Let’s try another option.

To enable touchpad type in the following:

synclient TouchpadOff=0

or like this:

You must find the touchpad id by typing:
**
xinput list**

and then:

**xinput set-prop ID “Device Enabled” 1
**
where ID is the “touchpad id” that we saw in “xinput list” output.

8

Thank you, the xinput set-prop command worked. My touchpad is functioning again.

Now I don’t suppose we can get my screen brightness controllable in KDE? Or possibly my keyboard backlight? I know the former is an issue a lot of people have and from what I’ve seen, it likely isn’t solvable.

9

Try the following:

  1. Navigate to Configure Desktop –> Input Devices
  2. Next Keyboard model –> click on the dropdown arrow and select a Dell Laptop/notebook 6xxx/8xxx
  3. Click on the Apply button

If that doesn’t work try one of the other Dell keyboard laptop configurations close to your Dell Studio XPS 1340.

10

Follow Up

Open konsole, log in as root and type in:

echo 0 > /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness
11

Follow Up

Please ensure that you have installed laptop-mode-tools.

More info for you to read and try out.

This kernel provides a new experimental kernel boot parameter “i915.enable_backlight=0”.
i915.enable_backlight=0 can be used to disable i915 backlight control and the /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight interface – useful for systems where intel_backight conflicts with BIOS backlight control.

The default behavior is backlight enabled as usual (except see below). To actually disable the i915 intel_backlight interface, you must install this kernel AND boot with the new boot parameter set to “0” as indicated above.

12

I copied a paragraph from an Ubuntu page about the new kernel boot parameter to the previous posting.

The experimental kernel boot parameter “i915.enable_backlight=0”. You can add it without the quotes using the Yast-Boot Loader and then rebooting the laptop.

13

I installed laptop-mode-tools, though I’m not sure what to do with it.

Echoing 0 to /sys/class/backlight/dell_backlight/brightness (intel_backlight doesn’t exist on my system) did nothing.

Adding the i915.enable_backlight=0 made my system carry over its previous-set brightness level on bootup. As I actually prefer it booting on max brightness, I removed the option.

The change to Dell Latop/notebook… in Input Devices made no difference, and the Fn + Right arrow still disables touchpad and keyboard as well as controlling keyboard backlight level.

I did notice something new, though. When the keyboard was disabled, I tried using the Kvkbd virtual keyboard to enter the command to re-enable the touchpad, and that didn’t work either. I would have thought that a virtual keyboard wouldn’t be affected.

14

I did notice something new, though. When the keyboard was disabled, I tried using the Kvkbd virtual keyboard to enter the command to re-enable the touchpad, and that didn’t work either. I would have thought that a virtual keyboard wouldn’t be affected.

The only way to fix that is with konsole using synclient.

What type of graphics card are you using? If it’s an nVidia card do you have the drivers installed?

Also, I really think that you should submit a Bugzilla report on the kernel.

15

Follow Up

About the keyboard brightness press FN+ESC or FN+F1. This may put your laptop to sleep.
When it comes out of sleep it has helped a number of some users from different forums.

16

The laptop-mode-tools is a package of scripts that help with hard drive spin down and battery charge and discharge and some more that you should read about.

Try typing:

  • man laptop-mode-tools
  • laptop-mode-tools --help
17

Please type in the line below to find what’s in the backlight folder:

ls /sys/class/backlight/

18

Sorry, it’s an Nvidia GeForce 9400M G. I’m currently using the G03 proprietary drivers (310.32) from Nvidia’s repo. I have tried the nouveau drivers and they have the same backlight issues, in addition to other glitches/annoyances.

Pressing Fn+ ESC or F1 (which is my laptop’s sleep key) did nothing. I was able to configure Fn+F1 to make linux sleep, but waking from said sleep wasn’t special in any way.

So which of my issues (screen backlight or keyboard/touchpad disabling) do you think I should report a kernel bug on?

19

For the nVidia card, navigate to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/50-device.conf and add the following below the text that already exists in the file:

Section "Device"
    Identifier "Device0"
    Driver "nvidia"
    VendorName "NVIDIA Corporation"
    Option "RegistryDwords" "EnableBrightnessControl=1"
EndSection

Reboot your laptop and see what happens. The Option “RegistryDwords” “EnableBrightnessControl=1” only works with nVidia cards and should enable the brightness function.

Pressing Fn+ ESC or F1 (which is my laptop’s sleep key) did nothing. I was able to configure Fn+F1 to make linux sleep, but waking from said sleep wasn’t special in any way.

So which of my issues (screen backlight or keyboard/touchpad disabling) do you think I should report a kernel bug on?

I would make a separate bug report for “screen backlight or keyboard/touchpad disabling” under KDE4 system or workspace. The application is ktouchpadenabler.
And a second one under kernel. Your keyboard key is hardwired with the keyboard light sensor. The Studio XPS 1340 keymap is missing.

Use “xmodmap -pke” >mykeycodes.txt (without the quotes). This will provide your keycodes. BTW See this submission first 316329 – Shortcut to disable touchpad not configurable / conflicts with fn-keys
Use “xev” (without the quotes). Press your keycombos. Copy and paste the results to a file that you can upload. Most likely the people on Bugzilla will notify you by email.

20

Please check your BIOS settings for keyboard brightness key. Write down all of the settings and then post here.

I’m still waiting for the results of:

Please type in the line below to find what’s in the backlight folder:

ls /sys/class/backlight/

Keep the nVidia entry but try kernel 3.8 by adding the repository to Yast. However, you must uninstall the nVidia drivers provided by openSUSE. Download the latest driver from the nVidia website and install using the command:

sh NVIDIA*run

You can try a different kernel 3.8x and see if there is any change. Index of /repositories/Kernel:/stable/standard

Also check while you are in the Grub2 shell before booting. Use the FN+right key or was it left and see if the touchpad works. If it does then it must be the kernel.