Xmodmap mismapping in Wayland + No X sessions on KDE

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1

Hello everyone,

I just realized that something is wrong with my xmodmap keymaps.

Environment

  • Xmodmap

    user@lapi ~> xmodmap -pke | rg ' 19 = |  31 ='
keycode  19 = 0 equal 0 parenright downarrow degree bracketright
keycode  31 = u U Cyrillic_u Cyrillic_U udiaeresis Udiaeresis Byelorussian_shortu Byelorussian_SHORTU
user@lapi ~> rg ' 19 = |  31 =' .Xmodmap
12:keycode  19 = 0 equal 0 parenright downarrow degree bracketright
24:keycode  31 = u U Cyrillic_u Cyrillic_U udiaeresis Udiaeresis Byelorussian_shortu Byelorussian_SHORTU
user@lapi ~> xmodmap .Xmodmap

  • Session type
    echo $XDG_SESSION_TYPE wayland

  • KDE version

    plasmashell -v
plasmashell 6.4.5

Issue

In theory, udiaeresis should only be printed when I press “layer 3 modifier + key 31”, but X prints downarrow instead, which should only be printed when I press “layer 4 modifier + key 19”. It used to work, but it doesn’t anymore.

Does anyone have any ideas for troubleshooting or fixing?

Current troubleshooting

  • Last time I checked about a month ago, I remember my session being of type X, but it is now Wayland.

  • Opened a cross-post on KDE Discuss

    • They told me that I might have deleted the X11 session packages, but I do not remember doing anything like that.

      • I still have some X binaries installed

        which xmodmap startx
/usr/bin/xmodmap
/usr/bin/startx
2

plasma-x11-session and kwin-x11 were not installed. I reinstalled them and rebooted my system.

I did not manually delete them, but I noticed quite a few things went out of wack one or two KDE releases ago… I just fixed the minor things without thinking too much about it until I realized that my keymaps were also not right.

If anyone knows what might have happened, then please let me know.

3

X11 is no longer installed by default for new installs. An update shouldn’t remove valid packages unless there’s a conflict. :man_shrugging:

xmodmap has been deprecated for over a decade.

5

Some 13 years ago, when I started using Linux, I went through the options I had to make my own keymaps and xmodmap was the one that I got to work first, so I still use it. Deprecated or not, it’s been doing the job for 13 years and every now and then I have tried some other methods, but they were never as good or better. So, here I am… using the old tool that gets the job done :rofl: :man_shrugging:

I had a look at XKB back then too. It never clicked for me. I always found xmodmap to have a more intuitive interface.

And the release uninstalling those two packages :person_shrugging: I don’t even know which one it is, because I have been fixing a trickle of little problems with my set-up for some time, until the bigger problem knocked on my door and I realized what had happened.

I am in the testing branch. Maybe something slipped through from unstable? :person_shrugging:

6

kwin-x11 was split into a separate package and as such it was never installed. I presume plasma-x11-session is also a new package and thus wasn’t installed either.

$ paclog | grep kwin-x11
[2025-08-04T20:13:20+0100] [ALPM-SCRIPTLET] The KWin X window manager has been split to a separate kwin-x11 package.

However that shouldn’t matter, and this affects more than just xmodmap - there seems to be a bug which is fixed/overridden by something in one of those packages. :man_shrugging:

Sooner or later you’ll experience problems with xmodmap.

xkb can do more, but whether you need to do more is another matter. It’s more complicated as a whole, but you really only need to copy a layout, modify it, then configure the system to use it.

Anyway your computer. :smiley:

7

I just noticed that your user profile says you are on Stable branch, which cannot be the case if you are running Plasma 6.4.5. Stable branch is still on Plasma 6.3.6.

Please update your user profile by visiting this page: Forum Profile Preferences

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