Wireless Keyboards and Mice

**stryder144** · 10-09-2002, 01:59 PM

Alright folks, I have a quick question or two regarding wireless keyboards and mice (such as the logitech freedom series).

Is there any special software needed to get them running under linux? I'm assuming that the receiver translates the radio frequencies into standard usb/ps2 compatible commands (as if it was directly connected to the usb port or ps2 port). Am I right or wrong in my assumption? Which keyboard/mouse is best supported? Are there any configuration tools (gui or cli) that aid in configuring the hotkeys on these keyboards?

I am looking to replace the keyboard and mouse on my Microtel computer. Since that is the case, I figured that the wireless stuff is nice, so I would rather purchase that instead of the traditional stuff.

Any thoughts?

Cheers

**grimey** · 10-10-2002, 03:03 AM

as far as i know that assumption is correct, if you have them into the usb or ps/2, the kernel doesn't know the difference.

in terms of hotkeys, that depends on your window manager. you need to be able to map specific F-keys to specific commands in order to use the hotkeys. the first thing you do is use xmodmap to change the keycodes to some F-key, then use the window manager to map the F-key to a specific command.

for example, i set the keycodes for my logitech iTouch buttons to F21 and F22, then i used icewm's key options to map F21="aumix -w -2" and F22="aumix -w +2"

the xmodmap is the tuff part. you need to use xev to figure out what the keycodes are for those buttons, then xmodmap is something like this in .xinitrc :

Code:

xmodmap -&lt;&lt;EOF
keycode 142=&quot;F21&quot;
keycode 144=&quot;F22&quot;
EOF
exec icewm

that's about it, i hope i made sense

**tolstoy** · 10-10-2002, 04:39 AM

I have that exact keyboard mouse combo and I can confirm that it runs under both RH and SuSE. Just make sure to have the usb connector and the ps2 connector plugged into your box from the rf base station.

As for the the hotkeys, I haven't tooled around with that stuff yet.