Comments on: Xubuntu: Easily Switch Keyboard Layout

By: Jun Martin

Jun Martin — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 08:26:13 +0000

In Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex (8.10), go to System > Preferences > Keyboard.

In the Keyboard Preferences window, select the Layouts tab, press Other Options button and go to the last entry of the popup window, “Layout Switching” and choose from the thousands (grin) of possible combinations. However, the default “Both Alt” intermittently fails on me, so I added “Ctrl-Shift”.

Hope this helps…

By: everlasting daydream » Blog Archive » Changing your Keyboard layout in XFCE && X Window System

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 12:09:04 +0000

[...] http://ubuntu.sabza.org/2006/10/13/xubuntu-easily-switch-keyboard-layout/ [...]

By: Romanas

Romanas — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:01:10 +0000

There is another way to fix it:
1. Open /etc/X11/xorg.conf or XF86Config.
2. Find lines Section “InputDevice”
Identifier “Keyboard0″ …
3. Add into this keyboard section this line:
Option “XkbOptions” “grp:alt_shift_toggle”
4. Also you can add additional languages into line: Option “XkbLayout” “us,ru,lt”. just separate them with comma.

For Example my keyboard section.

Section “InputDevice”
# generated from default
Identifier “Keyboard0″
Driver “kbd”
Option “XkbModel” “pc105″
Option “XkbLayout” “lt,us,ru”
Option “XkbOptions” “grp:alt_shift_toggle”
EndSection

By the way, yuo can use:
ctrl_shift_toggle,
ctrls_toggle.

By: Romanas

Romanas — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:00:45 +0000

For Example my keyboard section.

By the way, yuo can use:
ctrl_shift_toggle
ctrls_toggle

By: korolmi

korolmi — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 10:08:51 +0000

oops, my previous post – found the problem: there is no such thing – “us” variant of “us” layout. Leaving variant blank for us layout resolved everything.

But it took me couple of hours to figure that out…

By: korolmi

korolmi — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 09:51:05 +0000

Still curious: in xubuntu /etc/X11/xorg.conf seems to recognize either keyboard toggle option or keyboard variant:

XkbLayout us,ru
XkbOptions grp:alts_toggle

works (I can switch layouts)

XkbLayout us,ru
XkbVariant us,winkeys

works (I can see correct variant in keyboard settings window)

XkbLayout us,ru
XkbVariant us,winkeys
XkbOptions grp:alts_toggle

does not work (cannot switch layouts but can see variant in keybosrd settings).

All I need is winkey variant or russian keyboard, cannot get it in xubuntu…

Any suggestions?

By: Ceesaxp

Ceesaxp — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 19:37:34 +0000

And why is editing /etc/X11/xorg.conf not considered an option? You can just easily add the same line there and won’t have to bother with any autostart items…

By: gabriel

gabriel — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 13:51:19 +0000

You forgot to mention that the file has to be set executable. Thanks for the tip. I now need to swap my control and Win keys to have this machine behaving correctly…

By: Steve

Steve — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 02:02:29 +0000

i used the xfce4-xkb-plugin with a french keyboard and always [left-shift][right-shift] just before logging in a xfce session.

reason for french keyboard: it was free.

By: ForeverNoob

ForeverNoob — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 15:49:43 +0000

Great keyboard layout trick, it worked for me. Just one question: I used alt_shift_toggle instead of alts_toggle, and only left shift-alt works – right keys combination does nothing. Any idea? Thanks