Questions[xmodmap](ubuntu)

I have scoured the web, and I can't seem to get Xmodmap / anything to work properly. I want to swap BOTH my Command keys with my Control key - in essence, inverting what they do currently.

How would I do that?

I tried xmodmap -e "keycode 133 = Control_L" and corresponding commands for keycodes 134 (right command) and 37 (control left). I even tried these commands, plus xmodmap -pke > ~/.Xmodmap and xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap in .xinitrc.

My end goal is I want HUD / Dash to come up when I click control and command to functional control, i.e., control-v is a commond shortcut to paste, i would click command-v

As my keyboard layout doesn't suit me, I run xmodmap on login. The script is named .profile and it runs OK, but it breaks the Unity interface.

I want to know where to put the xmodmap line so that it executes on my login and doesn't break anything.

I have already tried putting it in the .bash_login and .bash_profile files, without success (xmodmap doesn't set my keyboard).

What are my options?

When one presses and holds down certain keys like Control, Alt, Super, no release event is generated while with other keys' multiple release & press events are generated simulating the key being pushed & released several times.

I want to make some of the multimedia keys or the Fnkey on my keyboard into modifier keys, and xev shows that all of them are of the second type. Is it possible to make ordinary keys sticky so that no release event is generated?

Since I rarely use caps-lock, I'd like to map the key to a middle mouse click instead. I would also like to map Alt+Caps Lock to the original function of the caps lock key, should I ever need it.

I can map any keyboard shortcut to xdotool click 2, but the Gnome Keyboard Shortcuts dialog won't let me assign a command to the caps-lock key, even with modifiers.

I know this is a bit of a strange undertaking; How would I go about doing it?

I created the following ~/.Xmodmap file as per this answer.

keysym Delete = Menu
keysym Menu = Delete

clear Lock
keycode 0x42 = Escape

In other words, swap Delete and Menu, and make Caps Lock an additional Escape.

The next time I logged in, Ubuntu asked me if I wanted to load ~/.Xmodmap as expected. I loaded it, but nothing happened (either then or on subsequent logins). If I manually run xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap, it works as expected.

I know that this worked early in the 10.10 beta, but it's failing on my fresh 10.10 install. I haven't tried in on anything earlier than 10.10. Any ideas?

Edit: I put some debugging statements in /etc/gdm/Xsession to make sure ~/.Xmodmap was loading, and everything magically started working. I didn't change anything except adding some echos, and it's still working now that I reverted my changes and restarted again. Strangest thing I ever saw.

One thing I realized is that the "remap Caps Lock to Escape" part of the Xmodmap was always working. It was just the Delete/Menu swap that failed. I'll leave this question open for now in case anyone else has the same problem, since I don't actually know why the problem stopped.