Change behaviour of wireless toggle button

[Member TheBigBadBoy]

Hello !

I’m just wondering if it was possible to change the behaviour of the wireless toggle button (on my keyboard, it is a airplane logo).

In my case, I want to retrieve the last state of “connection”. But now, every time I toggle off wireless mode the Bluetooth keeps turning ON (even if Bluetooth was not enabled before).

I want the button to do the same as “Right click on Wi-Fi status from connman -> (un)tick ‘Offline mode'”.

I also know it is possible since it is what the button does on Windows (dual boot).

[Member TheBigBadBoy]

Helpful

Up

0

::

No one has a solution? Even a clue?

I know there is already some keys at ‘~/.icewm/keys’ but I don’t see the wireless toggle button…

I wish someone could help me !

[Member ModdIt]

Helpful

Up

1

::

I wish someone could help me !. Have you tried to help yourself?.

DDG or whatever is your friend.
Had you tried you would have found that a keypress gives some code depending on device
which is translated to a code.
As you have also windoze you can startwith.
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/learnwin32/keyboard-input

You have the device and can find out how to read and convert a code to get the result you want.

[Member TheBigBadBoy]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Thank you for the reply !

I’ll dig in ^^

[Member ModdIt]

Helpful

Up

2

::

Thanks for understanding reaction.
Sadly there is no standard for keyboard codes within the computer industry,
with older and common devices someone may already have a fix.

In your case the device is not so common and probably not often used with
debian antiX.

When you ask for help it is better to repeat info rather than hoping a
possible helper/user will trawl through previous posts to figure out what
you are using and up against.

[Member madibi]

Helpful

Up

1

::

I’m not sure about how it is done your toggle button.
You can try with the “xev”, and if you are lucky, when you press the toggle button, the xev command gives you back a code.
Then with “xmodmap” you can change that code to the function that you desire.
For example, in the Apple keyboard in that way I can change the right-apple in the AltGr of the pc keyboard
I hope that this info may help you
good luck!
m

[Member TheBigBadBoy]

Helpful

Up

1

::

> When you ask for help it is better to repeat info rather than hoping a
> possible helper/user will trawl through previous posts to figure out what
> you are using and up against.
Okay, I get it. Sorry for my ignorance…

Thanks to you both for your answers, I’ve already made good progress.
I didn’t know that it was possible to get the code of a keyboard key, so I looked into it (after trying ‘xev’). So I came up with a solution: ‘showkey’. My button is found to have the code 247, and in ‘xmodmap’ no key/output is assigned to it.
So I’d like to put in an appropriate output (hopefully overwriting the current behaviour), e.g. ‘XF86ToggleWireless’ (in the same idea as ‘XF86AudioLowerVolume’) but it doesn’t exist.
Once done, I would add to the commands in ‘~/.icewm/keys’ what this button will do.

So my problem is: what logical button/key (XF86xxxx?) could I give to the physical wireless disconnect button?
In the list here (https://wiki.linuxquestions.org/wiki/XF86_keyboard_symbols), could I take any unused key ? (Or perhaps there is a better key than XF86xxxx?)

P.S. English is not my first language, so please excuse me if I choose my words badly…

[Member madibi]

Helpful

Up

1

::

if you google search: “xmodmap keycode list”

you can find a lot of codes useful for you (e.g.: https://wiki.linuxquestions.org/wiki/List_of_Keysyms_Recognised_by_Xmodmap )

Then you have to write in the terminal something like:
xmodmap -e “keycode 134 = ISO_Level3_Shift” (<== This is the command for the Mac keyboard that I mentioned before)

in your case you have to change the value “134” with the code of the button that xev gives to you (you wrote =247),
and “ISO_Level3_Shift” with the function that you will find in your research of codes.

At the end you can also write an utility that you can add to the autostart.
For this latest point others are better prepared than me 🙂

I think that you are very close to your goal!

m

EDIT
I’ve also found: https://wiki.linuxquestions.org/wiki/XF86_keyboard_symbols

• This reply was modified 11 months, 3 weeks ago by madibi.

[Member ModdIt]

Helpful

Up

1

::

Just one more tip, make a snapshot of your antiX, prepare a non persistant live
stick from that, when experimenting or testing use the stick.
Once things work the way you want do a PERSONAL remaster so your settings and
customisation are kept.
Testing in above manner while running live means shutting down at any time will
lose any breaking or non working changes giving you a clean system on reboot.

When you are ready you can then transfer settings to your installed system or
reinstall from the stick. Y

[Member TheBigBadBoy]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Thanks, I’m almost done !

Here is the code that will execute the button :

if [ "$(connmanctl services | sed -n 13p)" ]; then
    sudo connmanctl enable offline
else
    sudo connmanctl disable offline
fi

Perhaps not the most elegant, but it works (I tested it IN A SHELL).

The problem I have now is that it appears that the button cannot be overwriten.
I did ‘xmodmap -e “keycode 247 = F13″‘ since F13 was not used, then added F13 to keys in ‘~/.icewm/keys’ : ‘key “F13” zzzfm’ (simple test to see if it works). But zzzfm won’t open, andthe behaviour of that button did not change unfortunately…
Is there any hope to overwrite its behaviour ? If it can help, keycode 247 (the toggle wireless button) is sent when I press the “Fn + F11” keys.

If there is no way to achieve this, well I will definitely use another combination of keys :’)

• This reply was modified 11 months, 3 weeks ago by TheBigBadBoy.

[Member madibi]

Helpful

Up

0

::

I don’t have your keyboard, I guess I should rather try the following:

‘xmodmap -e “keycode 247 = XF86WLAN’ (for the wifi)

(for the bluetooth the command should be:
‘xmodmap -e “keycode 247 = XF86Bluetooth’ )

please try it and let me know 🙂

m

• This reply was modified 11 months, 3 weeks ago by madibi.

[Member wildstar84]

Helpful

Up

0

::

I’ve had various struggles getting special keys to work and wrote a rather long (tl;dr) blogposts detailing my various solutions a few years ago. It’s a long read, but you may find some things of use in it not covered here.

https://wildstar84.wordpress.com/2016/04/27/make-special-hp-laptop-touchpad-toggle-key-work-in-linux/

Regards,

Jim

[Member blur13]

Helpful

Up

0

::

“If there is no way to achieve this, well I will definitely use another combination of keys :’)”

This will make your life easier. I’ve rerouted a lot of “special keys” to Super+”any key thats easy to reach from the home row” as a work-around, to discover that I actually prefer it that way. Adjusting e.g. brightness with Super+q/a is a lot quicker than stopping whatever you’re doing and looking for the right keys among the F-row.

[Member TheBigBadBoy]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Here is an update :

First, I will no longer use xmodmap, since it does nothing interesting in my case. In fact, thanks to wildstar84 I have discovered xbindkeys.
This program helped me in one thing : now, I know that the key binded to my wireless toggle button is XF86RFKill. I don’t need xbindkeys anymore either, since we can do exactly the same in ‘~/.icewm/keys’.

So, at the time I am writing, I can ALREADY toggle the wireless state (using a custom combination of keys) ! THANKS to every one in this thread ^^
I needed to create a script /usr/local/bin/wireless_toggle_button.sh.

I wanted to test further, by using the corresponding key with an airplane logo on it (with the key XF86RFKill). The fact is, if I add a command to that key (in icewm/keys or xbindkeys-config), it really add that command (and not overwrite it). For example, if I set ‘key “XF86RFKill” zzzfm’, then zzzfm will be opened at the same time rfkill will toggle each device states.
I don’t really want to “suffer” for “nothing”, trying for example the solution of wildstar84. It looks a bit too complicated for me.

EDIT:
Just one question : the script I’m using needs super-user privileges. So unfortunately it can only works (with the combination of keys) if I entered previously my password in a shell… How can I deal with it ?

• This reply was modified 11 months, 3 weeks ago by TheBigBadBoy.

[Member TheBigBadBoy]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Tadam, I finally got something to work, without root password !

So, for any future reference, here are all the things I have done :

Edit ‘~/.icewm/keys’ and add ‘key “Super+F11” wireless_toggle_button.sh’.
Create a script ‘/usr/local/bin/wireless_toggle_button.sh’. The code in it is

#!/bin/bash

if [ "$(connmanctl services | sed -n 13p)" ]; then
    sudo connmanctl enable offline
else
    sudo connmanctl disable offline
fi

And finally, change sudoers file in order to execute connmanctl without password (perhaps it is not the best solution, but it works).
So ‘sudo visudo’ and add ‘ALL ALL=NOPASSWD:/usr/local/bin/connmanctl’.

And voilà !

[Author]

Posts