extra key mappings
 

I'm running Redhat 7.1 with KDE, and I'm using a Memorex brand wireless keyboard. It has 8 keys in addition to the 105 that are situated at the top of the keyboard. The keyboard comes with proprietary software for getting these extra keys to do things, but naturally the software is only for windows. How does one go about mapping extra keys on linux with my system configuration? Even a starting point would be good, although I've explored the "Command Center" and my menus to the extant that I am capable. Anyone have any pointers? Thanks

*bump*

after a long time, no one has answered this poor persons question, so I will hope this brings it up a little....

Also, how can someone map keys to programs and things like that? For example, Windows+e on a win machine brings up explorer, how can that be mapped to konqueror or the like?

Hope someone helps us out!

To him I'd recommend paying a visit to
http://freshmeat.net, this project in
particular.

To you I'd suggest being a bit more
explorative :) ... I don't use KDE, and
it took me only 45 seconds to locate
what you are after in kcontrol.

Kcontrol -> Regional & Accesibility -> Keyboard Shortcuts

Cheers,
Tink

I understand your response that I should look more... I hope you believe me when I tell you I did. I googled and groups.googled for it, looked through the docs for KDE, but must have somehow overlooked it. I am with you in regards to exploring and trying to answer your own question before asking, but somehow I missed the answer. So thank you for shedding the little pointer for me so I can answer this one, I appreciate it!

Some more ideas / questions:

After playing with kcontrol (which can be accessed so easily with Alt+F2 and typing in 'kcontrol') I am starting to understand the power of this great DE! I have some ideas and questions, though...

I will be using KDE on my laptop, which is a dell inspiron 1100, and instead of having the trusty "win" key which kcontrol seems to support nicely, it has a "Fn" key between the left Alt and Ctrl. I would love to be able to map this key to keyboard shortcuts, to create a "Fn + e" to get my home folder, or "Fn + m" to minimize all the apps. I have heard of an app ( I believe console based) that can listen for keystrokes and return the linux interpreted name for it, like Mod3 Mod4 etc. Any suggestions or ideas of what that is, and how to get some advanced mappings happening?

Also, I found kmenuedit to be a real nice way to bind keyboard shortcuts to applications, for those who are looking for that option. you can change the current keyboardboard shortcut key for any app in your application menu in there. It would be great to combine that power with the extra power of mapping *all* the keys of the keyboard.

(I use Maya and other keyboard mapping intensize apps day in and day out, so you can understand my fanaticizism in getting my whole DE mapped to the keyboard!)

Hope we can get some great discussions happening about this.

Actually I haven't seen a version of
KDE yet that doesn't have kcontrol in
the menu and/or the launchbar...

Congratulations on discovering
Alt-F2, though ;)

As for the Fn-Key... for all I know
(this is the case for every notebook
I've used so far) it requires a machine-
specific program. My suggestion is to
go to http://freshmeat.net and enter
inspiron as the search term. Good luck.

Cheers,
Tink

actually you could map fn-combos(not all of them though, but my sound-keys for example work great like this) with xmodmap to F-keys you don't use and manipulate the functions through the .fluxbox/keys file, if you use fluxbox of course ... I don't know if such a way exists for KDE though, but might be worth to have a look at it ...