Re: DEC Keyboard Question

From: Ken Fairfield (my.full.name_at_intel.com)
Date: 01/26/05 

Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2005 16:37:42 -0800

My apologies...I think John and I have been talking past each other...

My problem has been to get all the keys on an LK461 passed through
the KVM to the Alpha. John seems to have been concentrating on
what those keys do on the Windows side...

John E. Malmberg wrote:

[...]
> F12, F13, F17, HELP, DO, AND KP MINUS, do not exist on a standard x86
> keyboard. The BELKIN KVM switch that I have does not seem to have any
> problem with sending them to the my DS10 after I switch to it.
>
> I have not tried convincing Reflections 4 to attemp to use them.
>
> These keys do work:
>
> KP-COMMA is the same scan code as the PLUS key.
> F18 is the same scan code as the PrtSc/SysRq key.
> F19 is the same scan code as the Scroll Lock key.
> F20 is the same scan code as the Pause/Break key.

OK, right, in a Windows environment, that's the (default) mapping
I see. Although I mis-remembered that KP-minus was missing with
KP-comma mapped to KP-plus; I had thought KP-comma was missing and
KP-minus mapped to KP-plus.

But I never considered this the root problem. I was pleasantly
surprized that, under Windows 2000 and XP, both KEA and eXceed
could "see" my key presses for the "extra" keys, and allow me to
map them within the application to the correct LK4xx key code or
keysym. That made me a happy camper since I could edit "naturally"
on VMS while sitting at my laptop. :-)

[...]
> Apparently you did not follow the Encompasserve links :-)

I have now. :-) This is actually very good news. My info is
clearly out of date, bit over a year old. Or perhaps I asked
Belkin the wrong question.

[...]
> I have the KVM switch connected to a x86 machine, and an Alpha and have
> been using it for a month now.
>
> My first reply today on this thread was composed by typing on a keyboard
> connected to that Belkin KVM which also switches the speakers and
> microphone at the same time, and I also logged into the system through
> Reflections 4, which worked the same as it always did. It did not see
> the extra keys.

So this is interesting. It would "appear", without the aid of some
signal tracing, that the KVM keeps the Alpha connection in mode 3
and passes all codes, while the PC connection is in mode 2 and passes
only the 104 or so key codes it "knows". Or is it that Reflection
doesn't know how to handle the LK461? What happens if you bypass the
KVM and plug the LK461 directly into the PC? Does Reflection see all
the keys then? If not, the problem is in Reflection, not the KVM
(at least, not necessarily).

[...]
> The only thing that took me by surprise is that the ALT-F19 or
> Alt-F19 toggles some DecWindows Motif mouse handling mode. And you have
> to use the same ALT key (right or left) to unset the mode as was used
> to set it.

I'll have to keep a lookout for that...

> The only reason that I got the KVM was that it was on about 50% rebate
> last month, making it very cheap, as it was already about the cheapest
> KVM in the store and it handled the audio. I figured if it did not
> work, I was not out much.

Sounds good! And for those not familiar with this device, the
Belkin F1DL102P is a 2-port KVM embedded in the cables. It sort
of looks like a wishbone. You don't need to buy separate cables,
which for Raritan and Rose switches can be _very_ expensive!

John, how long are the cables? It's not clear from the description.
I'm using 5ft cables from my current switch to the two systems I have
and I don't think I could go any shorter.

        -Ken 

-- 
I don't speak for Intel, Intel doesn't speak for me...
Ken Fairfield
D1C Automation VMS System Support
who:   kenneth dot h dot fairfield
where: intel dot com

Relevant Pages

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