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setxkbmap - set the keyboard using the X Keyboard Extension
setxkbmap
[ args ] [ layout [ variant [ option ... ] ] ]
The setxkbmap command
maps the keyboard to use the layout determined by the options specified
on the command line.
An XKB keymap is constructed from a number of components
which are compiled only as needed. The source for all of the components
can be found in /usr/share/X11/xkb.
- -help
- Prints a message describing
the valid input to setxkbmap.
- -compat name
- Specifies the name of the compatibility
map component used to construct a keyboard layout.
- -config file
- Specifies
the name of an XKB configuration file which describes the keyboard to be
used.
- -device device
- Specifies the numeric device id of the input device
to be updated with the new keyboard layout. If not specified, the core
keyboard device of the X server is updated.
- -display display
- Specifies the
display to be updated with the new keyboard layout.
- -geometry name
- Specifies
the name of the geometry component used to construct a keyboard layout.
- -I directory
- Adds a directory to the list of directories to be used to search
for specified layout or rules files.
- -keycodes name
- Specifies the name of
the keycodes component used to construct a keyboard layout.
- -keymap name
- Specifies the name of the keymap description used to construct a keyboard
layout.
- -layout name
- Specifies the name of the layout used to determine the
components which make up the keyboard description. Only one layout may
be specified on the command line.
- -model name
- Specifies the name of the keyboard
model used to determine the components which make up the keyboard description.
Only one model may be specified on the command line.
- -option name
- Specifies
the name of an option to determine the components which make up the keyboard
description; multiple options may be specified, one per -option flag. Note
that setxkbmap adds options specified in the command line to the options
that were set before (as saved in root window properties). If you want
to replace all previously specified options, use the -option flag with an
empty argument first.
- -print
- With this option setxkbmap just prints component
names in a format acceptable by xkbcomp (an XKB keymap compiler) and exits.
The option can be used for tests instead of a verbose option and in cases
when one needs to run both the setxkbmap and the xkbcomp in chain (see
below).
- -query
- With this option setxkbmap just prints the current rules,
model, layout, variant, and options, then exits.
- -rules file
- Specifies the
name of the rules file used to resolve the requested layout and model to
a set of component names.
- -symbols name
- Specifies the name of the symbols
component used to construct a keyboard layout.
- -synch
- Force synchronization
for X requests.
- -types name
- Specifies the name of the types component used
to construct a keyboard layout.
- -variant name
- Specifies which variant of
the keyboard layout should be used to determine the components which make
up the keyboard description. Only one variant may be specified on the command
line.
- -verbose|-v [level]
- Specifies level of verbosity in output messages.
Valid levels range from 0 (least verbose) to 10 (most verbose). The default
verbosity level is 5. If no level is specified, each -v or -verbose flag
raises the level by 1.
If you have an Xserver and a client
shell running on different computers and XKB configuration files on those
machines are different you can get problems specifying a keyboard map by
model, layout, options names. This is because setxkbcomp converts these
names to names of XKB configuration files according to files that are on
the client side computer, then it sends the file names to the server where
the xkbcomp has to compose a complete keyboard map using files which the
server has. Thus if the sets of files differ significantly the names that
the setxkbmap generates can be unacceptable on the server side. You can
solve this problem by running the xkbcomp on the client side too. With the
-print option setxkbmap just prints the file names in an appropriate format
to its stdout and this output can be piped directly to the xkbcomp input.
For example, the command
setxkbmap us -print | xkbcomp - $DISPLAY
makes
both steps run on the same (client) machine and loads a keyboard map into
the server.
xkbcomp(1)
/usr/share/X11/xkb
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