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tudor -Reinstate Monica-
Asked: 2015-07-16 15:41:15 +0800 CST

All keyboards stopped working after login screen

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My new Dell Venue 11 Pro 7140, running Ubuntu 15.04, developed a fault. It appears that all keyboard input fails after the login screen. The mouse functions normally.

The catch is that the on-screen keyboard doesn't work either, and neither does keyboard input from synergyc, so I'm guessing it's some kind of unity input module that's gone awry.

However, other input events such as the volume buttons appear to be functioning normally.

I've tried a complete shut down and cold boot but no go. :-(

Luckily, I have an ssh server open, so I can investigate further.

$ dmesg | grep keyboard
[    1.060171] input: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard as /devices/platform/i8042/serio0/input/input2
$ cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep 'keyboard'
[     5.211] (**) Video Bus: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall"
[     5.213] (II) evdev: Video Bus: Configuring as keyboard
[     5.214] (**) Power Button: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall"
[     5.214] (II) evdev: Power Button: Configuring as keyboard
[     5.216] (**) Integrated_Webcam_FHD: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall"
[     5.264] (II) evdev: Integrated_Webcam_FHD: Configuring as keyboard
[     5.264] (**) Integrated_Webcam_8M: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall"
[     5.264] (II) evdev: Integrated_Webcam_8M: Configuring as keyboard
[     5.270] (II) config/udev: Adding input device AT Translated Set 2 keyboard (/dev/input/event2)
[     5.270] (**) AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall"
[     5.270] (II) Using input driver 'evdev' for 'AT Translated Set 2 keyboard'
[     5.270] (**) AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: always reports core events
[     5.270] (**) evdev: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: Device: "/dev/input/event2"
[     5.270] (--) evdev: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: Vendor 0x1 Product 0x1
[     5.270] (--) evdev: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: Found keys
[     5.270] (II) evdev: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: Configuring as keyboard
[     5.270] (II) XINPUT: Adding extended input device "AT Translated Set 2 keyboard" (type: KEYBOARD, id 12)
[     5.271] (**) Dell WMI hotkeys: Applying InputClass "evdev keyboard catchall"
[     5.271] (II) evdev: Dell WMI hotkeys: Configuring as keyboard

To be clear, this is not a duplicate of the "Keyboard stopped working" questions I looked at because:

  • All keyboards worked perfectly fine yesterday
  • It works at startup
  • It works during/after GRUB
  • It works during the login screen
  • The problem exists after a cold boot (so not a suspend issue)
  • It affects all keyboards (USB, bluetooth, on-device "windows" key, onscreen, and synergyc), so it's not a keyboard switch issue

What else could be giving this symptom?

unity

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    I stumbled upon this answer Why did my keyboard stop working? and it seems that I've accidentally hit some key combination that turned on slowkeys, but it only had an effect after the login screen.

    So, to fix this, go to:

    System Settings → Universal Access → Typing (tab): switch off "Slow keys"

    Also switch off "Enable by Keyboard" if you want to stop it happening again.

    It don't know why the login screen ignores this setting, tho.

    Update

    I just did this again (d'oh!) which brought me back to this answer and gave me the initiative to find out what triggered it.

    Apparently, if you have Enable by keyboard on and then you hold down the Shift key for eight seconds, it will enable/disable slowkeys.

    This was a new setup, and I had enabled Enable by keyboard because I wanted a way to flip between touchscreen and keyboard mode easily. Might not be worth the effort, tho!

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