Bug#621835: xmodmap -e 'remove lock = Caps_Lock' no longer works.

[Luca Capello <luca@pca.it>]

unarchive 621835
reopen 621835 !
found 621835 7.6+3
severity 621835 important
thanks

[Resending because the bug was archived thus the BTS rejected this
 email, I was sure it would have worked because I seem to remember it
 did work in the past.  Sorry if you got it twice.]

Hi there!

Reopening this bug, setting myself as submitter, adding the current
version of x11-xserver-utils in unstable and setting Severity:
important, for obvious reasons.

On Sun, 10 Apr 2011 03:40:40 +0200, Cyril Brulebois wrote:
> jidanni@jidanni.org <jidanni@jidanni.org> (10/04/2011):
>> Nobody can figure out how to do it because there are no examples on
>> the setxkbmap man page.
>
> I wrote it's an option. So you use:
>   setxkbmap -option $whatiwrote
>
> and that works.

That does not mean that it is easy to find it out, and I was in the same
situation as jidanni, here why.

I wanted to map Caps_Lock as Control_L, so I fired up `man xmodmap` and
found an example (then discovering a bug, see #641588), but I was too
much optimistic.  Having found this bug I thought that something like

  $ setxkbmap -option caps:ctrl

would have been correct.  Finally, /usr/share/X11/xkb/rules/base.lst
told me that what I wanted was the following command, which is
counterintuitive to say the least:

  $ setxkbmap -option ctrl:nocaps

>> CB> And stop using xmodmap, that's obsolete.
>> 
>> Well why don't you put a warning on its man page. Else how is
>> anybody supposed to know?
>
> Well, nobody bothered to send a patch. Feel free to.

Nothing wrong with you, but I hope you are kidding, especially for the
obsolete part.

1) it seems that xmodmap is still developed:

     <http://cgit.freedesktop.org/xorg/app/xmodmap/>

2) why is CapsLock the only key that stopped working with xmodmap, while
   for the other everything is OK?  Until today I was using myself with
   success the following ~/.xmodmaprc:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
!! unset Caps_Lock and Win_key
remove lock = Caps_Lock
remove mod4 = Super_L
! Caps Lock as Win key
keycode 66 = Super_L
add mod4 = Super_L
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

I completely understand John's feelings, xmodmap is a default/old Unix
tool, why breaking it?  What are the advantages of the latter?

  <http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?archive=yes&bug=621835#41>

Thx, bye,
Gismo / Luca