Ubuntu – How to make gnome-tweaks changes apply to a newly plugged in USB keyboard without going through the GUI

gnome-tweakskeyboardkeyboard-layout

I use gnome-tweaks to turn my Caps Lock into a Control Key. This works normally, but not when I plug in a new external keyboard. I can make it work by:

Opening gnome-tweaks
Getting to the right place on the GUI: Keyboard & Mouse -> Additional Layout Options -> Caps Lock behaviour
Flipping between any other option and "Caps Lock is also a Ctrl"

Is there some terminal command I can run that will refresh gnome-tweaks for my currently plugged in devices? Failing that, is there a command I can run that will do this switch I'm currently doing manually?

This is a bug, but it's affecting my current version and the above would serve as a workaround.

Best Answer

This is untested, but you may want to try:

gsettings reset org.gnome.desktop.input-sources xkb-options
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.input-sources xkb-options "['caps:ctrl_modifier']"

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to programmatically change the keyboard layout

I too use Ubuntu 12.04 and have stuggled with this issue. Using Jason Coombs' answer to his own question as a starting point, I was able to use /etc/default/keyboard to set my keyboard options (for me, ctrl:nocaps and compose:menu) and have that persist across reboots for consoles. However, the setting would be ignored by LightDM/Unity upon reboot. To clarify, I have not set any keyboard preferences from within Unity, so Unity should be defaulting to the system default keyboard settings, but it is not using the keyboard options for some reason.

I noticed that if I run the following command after logging in, Unity suddenly begins to recognize my system default keyboard options:

setxkbmap

I do not supply any parameters to setxkbmap, I merely invoke it with no options and it reads and applies the system default map.

To make this happen automatically when any user logs in (at least, any user with a Gnome or Unity desktop), I have made the following setxkbmap.desktop file that I placed in the /etc/xdg/autostart/ directory:

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
TryExec=/usr/bin/setxkbmap
Exec=/usr/bin/setxkbmap
Hidden=false
NoDisplay=true
X-GNOME-Autostart-enabled=true
Name[en_US]=System Keyboard Fix
Name=System Keyboard Fix
Comment[en_US]=Apply system-wide keyboard settings to the session
Comment=Applies system-wide keyboard settings to session

This fix seems to make the keyboard options consistent system-wide, with the exception of the brief period that LightDM has control of my screen before I log in.

Ubuntu – How to disable keyboard layout switching with both shift keys

You were probably hit by bug #1762952. One way to fix it:

Open /etc/default/keyboard for editing and replace the line starting with
```
XKBOPTIONS
```
with
```
XKBOPTIONS=""
```
Run this command to disable it from the desktop settings as well:
```
gsettings reset org.gnome.desktop.input-sources xkb-options
```

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to programmatically change the keyboard layout

Ubuntu – How to disable keyboard layout switching with both shift keys

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