Keyboard locking up in FC17

[Tod Thomas]

On 09/25/2013 11:45 PM, Geoffrey Leach wrote:
> On 09/25/2013 12:40:47 PM, Tod Thomas wrote:
>> On 09/25/2013 08:06 AM, Ian Malone wrote:
>>> On 25 September 2013 13:01, Ian Malone <ibmalone at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> On 24 September 2013 19:33, Tod Thomas <fr33zone at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> I've read that fc17 is end of life but maybe someone has run into
>> this.  I'm
>>>>> running fc17, latest upgrades, using XFCE, and periodically the
>> keyboard
>>>>> just stops working, mouse is fine.  I end up having to mouse over
>> ALL of my
>>>>> open windows saving and closing.  Once I logoff and logon
>> everything works
>>>>> normally.  I've checked the Xorg log, messages, dmesg, everything
>> I can
>>>>> think of but its sill happening.  I even tried turning off the
>> screen saver
>>>>> but that didn't help either.  It happens inconsistently which
>> makes it even
>>>>> more annoying :)
>>>>>
>>>>> Not sure there's a single answer given the possible moving parts
>> involved.
>>>>> If nobody can think of anything off the top of their head could
>> someone
>>>>> suggest a good way to try and debug?  I'll be upgrading here
>> eventually but
>>>>> right now the timing is not optimal.
>>>>>
>>>> Can you change to a virtual console (Ctl-Alt-Fn where n!=1) when
>> this
>>>> happens? (And if not can you do it normally?) N.B. Alt-F1 should
>> get
>>>> you back to the desktop. Might help in working out whether this is
>> a
>>>> problem with X or with XFCE.
>>>>
>>> Also, may want to check you've not accidentally turned on some
>>> accessibility option like sticky keys. (This used to catch me out in
>>> KDE because a long shift keypress enabled it, until I got fed up
>>> enough to turn that off.)
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Good idea, I have not tried the virtual console check, I will the next
>>
>> time it happens.  Any idea how to turn off sticky keys in XFCW?  I
>> found
>> a suggestion using xkbset.
> If that doesn't work, try holding down the shift key for 20 sec.


Thanks all.  The shift key thing worked, the question is how did sticky 
keys get turned on in the first place?  Luckily when it happened this 
morning I had been tailing my syslog.

I had left my machine on all night because I was working on something.  
I turned on my monitor, Alt tabbed over to Firefox, logged onto a remote 
site, then tabbed over to Thunderbird, tabbed back to FF, lock.  Moused 
back to Thunderbird, read Joe's response, followed his instructions.  
Sticky keys wasn't enabled so enabled it but also selected 'Disable 
sticky keys if two keys are pressed' figuring that if the keyboard is 
reset; sticky keys enabled with this option, at the very least I could 
disable it with the two key approach.  Once I left the dialogue box I 
tried the keyboard, didn't work.  Moused over to the syslog screen and 
didn't see anything. Tried the two key operation and one of the letters 
showed up in the syslog!  Now it didn't show up as an entry in the log, 
but showed up on the screen nonetheless so at least the keyboard was 
working in some fashion.  I then tried Geoffrey's suggestion and it worked.

So, judging from the fix, somehow sticky keys got turned on this morning 
after very little, and no prolonged, keystroke use.  Going into the 
accessibility dialogue showed  sticky keys wasn't turned on previously 
either.  Turning it on there I don't think had any affect because I 
think the dialogue box was reporting it was off erroneously.

Ultimately, holding down the shift key for 20 secs worked.  So I think 
there is a solution but I'd be interested to know what avenue I could 
take to actually see it happen and get to the bottom of it? I'm not 
going to lose any sleep now that I have a work around but it has piqued 
my curiosity.  Thanks for all of your help so far.


- Tod