Gnome keyboard layout options (like remapping Caps Lock) are not reapplied after reboot

[Phil Sung]

Binary package hint: gnome-control-center

In Hardy Alpha 1, Gnome's keyboard Layout Options control panel (found on the Layouts tab of Keyboard Preferences) applies changes to the current session, but these changes are not reapplied after I reboot or logout/login again. This worked correctly on Gutsy.

Steps to reproduce:
1. Keyboard Preferences -> Layouts tab -> Layout options...
2. Under "Ctrl key position" choose "Make CapsLock an additional Ctrl"
3. Close the control panel and observe that CapsLock now acts as Ctrl
4. Reboot and log in again.
5. Observe that the setting change is no longer in effect (CapsLock does not act as Ctrl). To restore it, I need to open up the Layout Options control panel and choose that setting again, even though it already appears to be selected.

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

Thanks for your report, that works fine in my installation, does that works with another new user?

[Phil Sung (psung)]

I made a new user and found that it does not have this problem. I guess it is something about moving one's settings from a Gutsy setup. I've gotten around this problem by deleting my Gnome dotfiles. Thanks, and sorry for the noise.

[Phil Sung (psung)]

Actually, it still seems to break, but less regularly now...

[Bogdan Butnaru (bogdanb)]

This is happening to me all the time. The ones I use are "Swap Ctrl and CapsLock", "Right Alt chooses third level" and "Both Alt keys together switch layout" (although that last one doesn't seem to work, maybe because of AltGr).

This was a clean Gutsy install, updated to Hardy.

[Bogdan Butnaru (bogdanb)]

The annoying thing is that somehow even coding these options into the keyboard layout doesn't work. See bug #138467. I thought there might be a relationship, but the other users presumably didn't hack their layouts like I did.

I have two layouts, one that switches caps/ctrl itself and one that doesn't. After a login the switch isn't active on any of them, and after disabling/enabling it in the layout options tab it is active on both.

(Ideally, I'd prefer to be able to have this work differently on the two layouts, i.e. switched on my hacked layout and 'normal' on the other. It doesn't seem possible, and it wasn't even before this bug.)

[Bogdan Butnaru (bogdanb)]

After more testing, I think the problem might be with gnome-settings-daemon (which is still in gnome-control-center at the moment).

I noticed there are several other issues which I think that are related. I think _no_ keyboard settings are set-up at login, including the layout. For instance, I have a slightly modified dvorak layout set-up in gnome. However, X starts up with the normal dvorak keyboard (as it's set up in Xorg.conf). The differences are small, but I'm pretty sure my custom layout isn't used at login.

Also, if I restart gnome-settings-daemon (by killing it and running it again; is there any other way?), the settings take effect immediately; I don't need to re-set them in gnome-keyboard-properties. Since the options are shown as selected in gnome-keyboard-properties, I don't thing gconf's to blame.

[Vladimir Dobriakov (vladimir-geekq)]

Does somebody know, how does the "Keyboard Preferences" / "Layout Options" feature of gnome work? I mean:
* does it run xmodmap behind the scene?
    * every time you change something in the "Keyboard Preferences" dialog
    * plus every time you start the session
* does it manipulate XKB layouts?
* something else?

I have not found any information about gnome concepts in this area on the gnome web site. There are zillions of howtos on the web and part of them partly works, but without knowing the big picture of this multilayered keyboard layout system it is impossible to achieve a reliably working solution.

[1] About XKB: http://www.charvolant.org/~doug/xkb/html/xkb.html
[2] About XKB and Xmodmap http://www.faqs.org/docs/Linux-mini/Intkeyb.html

But this sources are possibly obsolete? Not to say about more obscure topics like proprietary keys, for example on my Thinkpad Notebook or Keyboard shortcuts through xbindkeys, keytouch, gnome features and others.

[André Barmasse (barmassus)]

Bug is confirmed under Hardy Heron Alpha 3 on my Sony Vaio VGN-FS195VP. After having updated Hardy a few days ago the Gnome keyboard layout keeps staying on the US keyboard layout - even though I have removed that one and installed only the Switzerland keyboard layout!! Strange enough, I can switch to my keyboard settings - at least for the time I am working within Gnome - just by clicking on anything in the "layout options". But after logging out of Gnome or rebooting the computer the keyboard is set back to the US layout. Evidently, the "gnome-keyboard-settings" simply does not store the settings made by the user.

[Bogdan Butnaru (bogdanb)]

As far as I can tell, it does store the settings, but gnome-settings-daemon doesn't apply them on the first login.

[Ming Hua (minghua)]

Just a "me too" note to say I started experiencing the same problem after upgrading gnome-control-center to version 1:2.21.90-0ubuntu1 and installing gnome-settings-daemon. I am using a US keyboard layout and my "Use capslock as ctrl key" option doesn't have any effect after login. Changing it away and back again in GNOME's keyboard setting makes it work.

I didn't have this problem before this recent upgrade. The system is upgraded from gutsy pretty early (before alpha 1 release), and I keep a quite up-to-date system, at least an upgrade per week.

[أحمد المحمودي (Ahmed El-Mahmoudy) (aelmahmoudy)]

On Fri, Feb 08, 2008 at 04:12:35PM -0000, Andrew Conkling wrote:
> Some upstream folks (and now I) wonder if this might actually be a
> different bug: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=511771. The
> behavior there sounds more like what is happening here. That bug was now
> fixed, so hopefully we'll be able to see an update soon.
---end quoted text---

Hello,

  I just updated gnome-settings-daemon, the bug got fixed !

--
 أحمد المحمودي (Ahmed El-Mahmoudy)
  Digital design engineer
 GPG KeyID: 0x9DCA0B27 (@ subkeys.pgp.net)
 GPG Fingerprint: 087D 3767 8CAC 65B1 8F6C 156E D325 C3C8 9DCA 0B27

[Andrew Conkling (andrewski)]

Some upstream folks (and now I) wonder if this might actually be a different bug: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=511771. The behavior there sounds more like what is happening here. That bug was now fixed, so hopefully we'll be able to see an update soon.

[Bogdan Butnaru (bogdanb)]

Yes, it would seem that's at least one of the causes. Could that patch be included directly in Ubuntu, until it propagates through from upstream (if it didn't already)? It's just a one-liner.

[Andrew Conkling (andrewski)]

Thanks, marking this as fixed then.

[أحمد المحمودي (Ahmed El-Mahmoudy) (aelmahmoudy)]

There is still this problem: I used to switch between US & Arabic layouts by pressing both ALT keys, that doesn't work now. If I change the "Layout Switching" option to "Both Shift keys together change layout" that option works (but by pressing both shift keys of course).

[Bogdan Butnaru (bogdanb)]

That's probably a different issue. Some of those layout switching options don't work for me either, but the rest are applied.

[Davide Bertola (dade)]

The problem is still present.
I'm using a clean hardy alpha 5 install.
I also did all upgrades today, and after reboot layout options are not applied.
I have to open Layout Options window and change something to apply them.

[Ming Hua (minghua)]

I am just saying that my problem described above was indeed fixed after upgrading gnome-settings-daemon (among with other packages) quite a while ago, and it is still fine now (last upgraded on 2008.02.29, definitely post-alpha5). So it's very likely there are two different issues with similar symptom here.

[Geoff Jacobsen (geoffj)]

I don't believe the problem is fixed. It appears to me to be a race condition; I have my system setup to auto login and after a reboot the problem occurs but if I log out then back in it works fine. Under Gutsy I noticed a similar problem where the theme sometimes did not get setup properly when I logged in too quickly; I think it had something to do with hal.

[Hennadiy Brych (superg)]

Unfortunately bug wasn't fixed yet, at least after updating to Hardy today.
Interesting thing, that after disabling "Enable Automatic Login" in GDM configuration problem was fixed.
It's possible that GDM performs some initialization related to gnome-settings-daemon when not started in Autologin mode and otherwise not.

[Geoff Jacobsen (geoffj)]

As a work-around for the caps-lock problem I added the following to my ~/.gnomerc file:

xmodmap -e "remove Lock = Caps_Lock" -e "keysym Caps_Lock = Control_L" -e "add Control = Control_L"

This also stops the caps_lock light toggling on and off

[jiu (jacques-charroy)]

Now under Hardy beta, I'm having big problems with the keyboard layout. I have a german keyboard and use normally the layout with Sun dead keys. It worked well under gutsy. After updating the distro to hardy beta (a problematic process, it didn't complete successfully), my keyboard layout is all mixed up, I get strange characters instead of letters, although the keyboard layout manager still states the layout as being German with Sun dead keys. If I remove this layout and change to the normal german layout, I can type normal letters again. Then when I add the Sun dead keys layout and choose it as the default, it works well again, including 'ê'... until the next reboot, when I have to go through this same process again. The layout doesn't seem to get saved.
I'm not sure this is the right place for this lengthy text, but I now know that I'm not the kind of guy who should be trying a beta distribution :-). Let me know if you need more precisions, I'm not sure what file to enclose.

[Roman Polach (rpolach)]

I have this problem still in Hardy final with latest updates:
In Layout Options / Misc compatibility options I have set
"Shift with numeric keypad keys works as in MS Windows".
It takes an effect immediately but after reboot it behaves
like it wasn't set (but it is still checked in the layout options
dialog).

[Reuben S. (reuben-smith)]

I wanted to add another "me too" since I'm having this issue, too, periodically (but often). I installed Ubuntu Hardy as a new install soon after the release on a Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop with an regular US keyboard. The only keyboard setting I've changed is to set "Make CapsLock an additional Ctrl." under "Ctrl key position". It sets this correct when I select the option but does not always set it after I've logged in anew or rebooted. When the setting is not working, I go back into the Layout options, select a different setting then select "Make CapsLock an additional Ctrl." again it sets the setting correctly.

This is sort of an annoying bug, and it seems like a number of people are seeing it. Can I suggest that we up the triage and remove the fixed status on it?

[Robert Jirik (mail-jirik-deactivatedaccount)]

Me too here ...

same problem with Czech/US keyboard layouts. If I change anything in keyboard preferences, it works fine, but just until the system is rebooted, after that, I have to re-open the keyboard preferences and perform some change again ...

[Hans Deragon (deragon)]

US intl keyboard and auto login here. As previously reported, if I go to the keyboard layout options dialog box and reselect "Make CapsLock an additional Ctrl", it works, but the CapsLock light still toggle whenever I press the key. Also, my volume keys do not work, only the mute key.

[Henke (henrik-wallin)]

I had the same problem (ie CapsLock and Ctrl not swapped after reboot), but unchecking the toggle button "Separate layout for each window" seems to have corrected the behavior.

As a side note, it seems that only starting gnome-keyboard-properties temporarily solves the problem (until reboot), so choosing the correct setting again is not really necessary.

[Kevin Boaz (krboaz)]

Another Me Too...

I have this problem still in Hardy final with latest updates:
In Layout Options / Misc compatibility options I have set
"Shift with numeric keypad keys works as in MS Windows".
It takes an effect immediately but after reboot it behaves
like it wasn't set (but it is still checked in the layout options
dialog).

[Kevin Boaz (krboaz)]

"Shift with numeric keypad keys works as in MS Windows".
It takes an effect immediately but after reboot it behaves
like it wasn't set (but it is still checked in the layout options
dialog).

After doing some testing, I' not sure this is a race condition described in previous comments.

I tested System/Admin/Login Window with Enable Automatic Login enabled.
A reboot caused the "Shift with numeric keypad keys works as in MS Windows" to be broken.

I then tested System/Admin/Login Window with Enable Timed Login with 30, 60 and 90 second pauses before login.
A reboot caused the "Shift with numeric keypad keys works as in MS Windows" to be broken.

I then disabled the Automatic Login and logged in manually, both immediately and after a period of time.
In both cases, a reboot caused the "Shift with numeric keypad keys works as in MS Windows" to work properly.

In my case I was running Ubuntu 8.04 as a VMWare client on a Dell Inspiron 1721 Windows host running Vista.

So - for me at least, a temporary solution was to turn off the automatic login.
Not sure what a manual login would be running that the automatic is not, but there seems to be a difference.

[Hennadiy Brych (superg)]

Unfortunately bug isn't fixed yet. This is essential feature for my computer at home - not having to type login/password every time I turn on PC. Seems no one from Canonical is interested in fixing this...

[revkarl (revkarl)]

My "keyboard preferences" Have 'USA' and 'USA Dvorak' (labeled USA2, in the taskbar). After restart, I can still select USA or USA2, but without effect. Both have just the qwerty layout.

[LoonyPhoenix (loonyphoenix)]

When's this bug going to be fixed? This is very annoying.

[firun (cons-firun)]

There is some fix to this bug already.

You should reconfigure Xorg properly to make this feature work. So to be able to easily switch keyboard layouts, for example between a US and a Russin layout use this:

Option "XkbLayout" "us, ru"
Option "XkbOptions" "grp:caps_toggle"

I reconfigured Xorg once and it works properly even after rebooting.

[Simos Xenitellis  (simosx)]

Editing the file /etc/X11/xorg.conf is not a fix but a workaround.
A "workaround" is a temporary measure to get something working.
The proper way is to have our systems working without having to manually edit configuration files.

[Simos Xenitellis  (simosx)]

There is no reference to a fix in the Ubuntu source code.

[Shawn vega (svega85-gmail)]

just wanted to add another me too using default us layout and using compose keys for spanish class. and it's really anoying to have to redo the setting everytime.

[qintec (andrej-elias-qintec)]

I'm using the Ubuntu 8.04 (gnome) on a ASUS A6km laptop. I'm using two keyboard layouts [USA; Slovak (qwerty)]. Layout switching through Alt+Shift combiantion. Keyboard model: ASUS laptop.
Strange is that often, the Right CTRL key acts as Ctrl+End combination. It is very annoying when i'm programming in Kdevelop. If I press Left Ctrl - I get PopUp menu. On Right Ctrl press, the cursor jumps to the end of file (like with Ctrl+END). The same jump, when I press the END key. Sometimes it works fine, but mostly not.
I have disabled AutoLogin because I noted the problem after enabling autologin, It looked like a solution, but just for a short time. The problem is back...

[Iván Pérez (ivan.perez-keera.es)]

Same problem here. And by the way, I think this is NOT a duplicate of bug #196277 (I don't have that auto-login feature on, and never had it). The behavior is really annoying, the configuration is not lost but it's not applied either. It doesn't happen after every reboot. My layout is "es-es", but I never change it since all my keyboards (laptop, usb) use that layout.

Tell me if you need me to provide more information to help fix this bug.

[Iván Pérez (ivan.perez-keera.es)]

I'm using intrepid, by the way. I'm updated to the last version of gnome (and the last version of all its dependencies) available in the Ubuntu repositories.

[Iván Pérez (ivan.perez-keera.es)]

I'm sorry I had to unmark the bug as duplicate like that but I'm seeing lots of allegedly duplicate bugs being closed and, like I said in a previous comment, this bug is not related to #196277. I do not have auto-login on, I do have the last version available in the latest stable release installed, and I saw the symptoms of this bug two days ago in my 8.10.

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

could you reopen the upstream bug then if you still have the issue and think that's a GNOME bug?

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

did anybody send that to GNOME?

[Iván Pérez (ivan.perez-keera.es)]

Sebastien,
 I did not send this to Gnome, as I have not diagnosed that this is in fact a problem in Gnome (I only have this problem with Ubuntu Intrepid+Gnome, I did not take a look at Gentoo+Gnome, BSD+Gnome,...) I do cannot determine it is a bug in Gnome.

 Also, like I said before, I do not use auto-login. Therefore, this bug might not be related to #196277.

Maybe this bug should be renamed as "Gnome keyboard layout options (like remapping Caps Lock) are not reapplied after reboot (without auto-login)".