Keyboard shortcuts intercepted, Alt-d, Alt-gt, Alt-lt

[topherc]

On my Kubuntu 17.04 system, and perhaps 16.10 as well, Alt+d, Alt+>, and Alt+< have not been getting to any applications. My old fingers have been emacs-trained since the early 90's and only now do I realize how much I've been using these shortcuts in consoles, emacs, and atom. Alt+d is a default binding for readline too. These key chords never make it to my apps, so something in Plasma is intercepting them.

I've searched through all of the System Settings: Workspace->Shortcuts sections and none of these chords show up there. I've grepped through all of ~/.config, ~/.kde, and /usr/share but came up with nothing on these (except clipboard). Google doesn't help me either, which is a little spooky! Is it just me?

How can I even debug where these are getting intercepted? I see that when no windows are active, Alt+d and characters brings up Plasma Search. Also, Alt+d,s is supposed to bring up the clipboard widget. I removed clipboard from my system tray but that didn't help. I have no clue what Alt+>/< are binding to since nothing happens with these. Alt+Shift+d does get through, but that's really awkward to type.

On an Arch Linux system I have, running Plasma 5.10.3, these shortcuts all work fine.

Any ideas?

[GreyGeek]

SystemSetttings --> Shortcuts --> Global Shortcuts --> Plasma (or others on that tab)

[topherc]

Right, that's where I would have expected to find keybindings for Alt+d etc. But I don't. I can search for "Alt+D" too -- no results.

I should also mention that I tried creating a new user and logging in as that, just in case it was a matter of some old config of mine. No, these keys are still intercepted by Plasma for unknown reasons.

I've also tried the Cinnamon desktop, to see if it was specific to Plasma or not. No problems in Cinnamon, these key chords go straight through to the apps.

This should be easy for anyone to reproduce.
1) Create a new user
2) Log in as that user (a Plasma desktop environment)
3) Launch Konsole
4) Type "not working"<ctrl-a><alt-d>. If you just deleted "not", then you have not reproduced this problem.

[GreyGeek]

Can't you add/import your keys into the Plasma section? (and undo them in any other section).

[topherc]

Thanks for the suggestion! This gives me a temporary work-around. If I add these three shortcuts as bindings for global actions, that works as expected. There is no warning that the keys are already in use, which is interesting. But then when I un-assign that shortcut (delete button or click the Default: None radio button) and apply that change, the keys are no longer intercepted by Plasma and they get sent to the apps for handling. Perfect!

Except that when I log out and back in again, this change is lost and I have to do it again. Still it's a big help.

I'd really like to work out which component is intercepting these keys so I could begin to debug and, hopefully, fix the issue. Although it might be true that this issue has been resolved in Plasma 5.10.x and I have to either wait or find a way to install that in Ubuntu.

edit: Upgrading was easy: http://ubuntuhandbook.org/index.php/...kubuntu-17-04/
Trying this out now...
Now I'm on Plasma 5.10.4, and this problem persists. At least the work-around above is still valid. Even more strange that I cannot reproduce this on an Arch Linux system, only Kubuntu. I also have a Fedora box handy, and I'll try installing KDE on it. (It's currently running LXQt.)
edit: This issue does not appear on my Fedora box, now running Plasma 5.10.1. Only (k)ubuntu seems affected. Is it only my machine? Can anyone else reproduce this?

[vinnywright]

Right, that's where I would have expected to find keybindings for Alt+d etc. But I don't. I can search for "Alt+D" too -- no results.

I should also mention that I tried creating a new user and logging in as that, just in case it was a matter of some old config of mine. No, these keys are still intercepted by Plasma for unknown reasons.

I've also tried the Cinnamon desktop, to see if it was specific to Plasma or not. No problems in Cinnamon, these key chords go straight through to the apps.

This should be easy for anyone to reproduce.
1) Create a new user
2) Log in as that user (a Plasma desktop environment)
3) Launch Konsole
4) Type "not working"<ctrl-a><alt-d>. If you just deleted "not", then you have not reproduced this problem.

hay ,,,,@hear on Kubuntu-17.04 using just your line 3&4 in the example ,,,dose just that,,,,,,,,deletes the "not" so the key binding seems to be a default that works @hear .

VINNY

[topherc]

Thank you Vinny! That helps.

So this has to be something special on my system that is not affected by KDE upgrades, and not part of my user configuration. That explains why I haven't seen any other bug reports about this. I'll have to think about how to narrow this down. I'm thinking along the lines of a fresh Kubuntu install (in a VM), a script to find all files owned by relevant KDE/Plasma packages, and a comparison of those files on that and my broken system.

[jlittle]

Have you checked out System settings -> Input devices -> Keyboard -> Advanced? There's several items that could affect the Alt keys.

[GreyGeek]

"kcmshell5 <args> kcm_keyboard" in a script could be used in KDE startup to set up your keyboard. I haven't a clue as to what the args could be, but the man pages may offer some clues.