But that’s a user-owned file, so then why does it require the admin password to change those settings?
Furthermore, the settings don’t seem to stick. There is an xset line in my ~/.xinitrc, but it doesn’t have any effect. Upon logging into Plasma, I have to set the repeat and delay manually all over again.
On account of the compose key and the setting for always having the numeric keypad produce numbers (even when NumLock is off), I have now attempted to remedy that by modifying /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/00-keyboard.conf, but I don’t know yet whether it’ll work, because I’ll have to log out and log back in for that, and I’ve got too much stuff open right now. I’ll see whether I can test it later tonight.
This is my /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/00-keyboard.conf now…
# Read and parsed by systemd-localed. It's probably wise not to edit this file
# manually too freely.
Section "InputClass"
Identifier "system-keyboard"
MatchIsKeyboard "on"
Option "XkbLayout" "be"
Option "XkbModel" "pc105"
Option "XkbOptions" "compose:rwin"
Option "XkbOptions" "numpad:mac"
EndSection
Probably because of the keyboard part to set the type/lang/variant which seems to be a system setting, not a user one?
Indeed I can confirm that, I did some tests and it does not keep the settings after reboot, even if the .xinitrc file contains the configuration line.
However, if I type this command from .xinitrc into my terminal, and open the System Settings → Keyboard config, the command itself works, so it seems it is not loaded properly on login/boot.
//EDIT: so from my test and research, .xinitrc (or .xprofile, I tried to create that file and use it too) is not executed when the KDE desktop loads. I removed the xset r rate 200 50 line from .xinitrc and added it to System Settings → Startup and Shutdown → Autostart and it works as intended so it is not a race condition or an override I think, it just doesn’t seem to load the .xinitrc file when the desktop loads.
Okay, I have now solved all of the keyboard problems I was having, albeit that I had to set up things in different places. I will describe the solutions below.
1. The compose key problem
I managed to solve this by editing /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/00-keyboard.conf. The file now looks as follows…
# Read and parsed by systemd-localed. It's probably wise not to edit this file
# manually too freely.
Section "InputClass"
Identifier "system-keyboard"
MatchIsKeyboard "on"
Option "XkbLayout" "be"
Option "XkbModel" "pc105"
Option "XkbOptions" "compose:rwin"
EndSection
2. The keyboard repeat rate and delay, and the Mac-style “numbers-only” numeric keypad
I have tried the approach proposed by @omano via a script in Plasma’s Autostart section, but that didn’t work. I have solved it now by creating a new (root-owned and world-executable) script under /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.d/, called 70-keyboard_settings.sh, whose contents are the following…
#!/bin/sh
xset r rate 180 76
setxkbmap -option "numpad:mac"
The behavior is now again as desired, and as it used to be before whatever changes were applied by the update referenced in the opening post…:
The right win-key now works as a compose key again.
The numeric keypad now always produces numbers, regardless of whether Num Lock is on or off and regardless of whether the Shift key is pressed or not, just as it is on a Mac.
Keyboard repeat rate and repeat delay are now as I want them, immediately upon logging into Plasma.
I am therefore going to mark this thread as solved, even though there may be people with yet other keyboard-related problems, to which I have linked here on this thread.
Thank you to everyone who responded and helped me on my way to finding the solution to my multiple and seemingly unrelated keyboard problems.
What I did was actually adding the whole command as an application not a script (it created a .desktop file for it). But your solution may be better anyway as it is system wide now I think, mine was for my user only for the desktop environment only.
//EDIT: there is still an issue though in Manjaro Settings then, if the keyboard delay/speed is saved but not loading after reboot, that might be worth an issue on Gitlab I guess.
not a script (it created a .desktop file for it). But your solution may be better anyway as it is system wide now I think, mine was for my user only for the desktop environment only.