Arch is perfect but....

venky80 · 2008-02-04 04:33:15

I am really happy with arch but i have been installing many othe linux distros on virtualbox and seeing what advances have they made and I have another partition where I try other distros too.
What I have found is many of the distros such as ubuntu and pclos recognize my laptop function keys for brightness volume etc.( i have posted this issue in arch forums http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=19671 but haven't got any help regarding it) which makes me believe there is a solution out there. Also there are small issues with suspend to ram hibernate etc. yes I have done whatever the wiki says.
Today I tried sidux in virtualbox and was surprised to see the the mouse integration works out of the box, it is that automatic mouse recognition when u r in the virtualbox window thing which happens if u have winxp installed along with guest OS addition in virtualbox.
I know arch is pretty much bleeding edge,why cant I get all this working?
Can any expert help me?

Pajaro · 2008-02-04 08:04:25

The reason why extra keyboard functions don't work in arch is because extra functions require extra applications, and arch performs only a base installation. Also, many users don't use/have this extra keys, so it is a work that will benefit only a part of the users. If you use kde you could add create a patch for kdemod and send it to the kdemod developer.

I've been using arch linux for some years (4 i guess) and it is the only linux distro i used. I tried others, but got stuck: when you wanted to hack a bit, they were too complicated. In arch it is easy to understand how things actually work. I also missed multimedia keys and some other stuff in archlinux. I ended up learning that almost all the things that i missed in the past were adopted by core linux projects, so one day they just worked, or arch developers ended up adding them.

Arch bleeding edge means that you benefit from softwares updates as soon as they come out. So if a software update adds what you look for, you benefit from it right away (in ubuntu, as an example this updates com with some months of delay). They don't hack applications so that you get things done automatically. This would make arch linux complicated, and it's main goal would be lost (KISS philosofy), so it would become another distro.

Of course, you are free to extend arch linux with your cusstom packages, but trust me, handling every single update of every single package so that everything stays automatic requires a lot of work, and kind of a lost work, because eventually a simple way of doing what you miss will come out and your work will become pointless at that point. Arch devs focus on the core. Thanks to this arch is simple.

wuischke · 2008-02-04 08:45:42

Please see: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Extra_Keyboard_Keys

It works in Arch as well, but you have to configure it yourself. I use xbindkeys and a custom keymap in terminal to make my extra keys work. First I had to find out the key codes (see above wiki article) and then I simply set the following things in my ~/.xbindkeysrc

"amixer set Master toggle"
  c:160

"amixer set Master 2dB+ unmute"
  c:176

"amixer set Master 2dB- unmute"
  c:174

"xmms2 toggleplay"
  c:162

"xmms2 pause"
  c:164

"xmms2 prev"
  c:144

"xmms2 next"
  c:153

venky80 · 2008-02-04 15:43:11

What about screen brightness, I tried xbindkeys a while back , didn't really work for some keys, I will try again

Mr Green · 2008-02-04 16:05:52

if xev picks up keys then you can use keycodes as above...... I am sure screen brightness worked in linux on my old laptop

alex_anthony · 2008-02-04 17:50:02

On my laptop, brightness controls are run by BIOS, so I don't have to set anything up on any distro
Perhap have a look in BIOS setting on your laptop

Arch Linux

#1 2008-02-04 04:33:15

Arch is perfect but....

#2 2008-02-04 08:04:25

Re: Arch is perfect but....

#3 2008-02-04 08:45:42

Re: Arch is perfect but....

#4 2008-02-04 15:43:11

Re: Arch is perfect but....

#5 2008-02-04 16:05:52

Re: Arch is perfect but....

#6 2008-02-04 17:50:02

Re: Arch is perfect but....

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