Within the dialogue, holding the meta key causes a series of four boxes (three boxes, with the fourth recessed down as if it was a subscript) to appear -- the sort that one sometimes sees when opening a file in a text editor that isn't meant to be read that way. The boxes appear before the key is released, thereby pre-empting any multiple-key shortcuts (e.g. meta+r) from being entered.

Can you please provide more context on your problem? Which version of KDE are you using? Which application is the problem being encountered with?

bcooksley wrote:Can you please provide more context on your problem? Which version of KDE are you using? Which application is the problem being encountered with?

Sorry, I'm using 4.2.

The problem seems to be universal, so I'm guessing plasma or khotkeys? I've tried setting it for several different applications and none of them work. For example, in KDE3 I had meta+d display the desktop, meta+t launch konsole, meta+space as play/pause in Amarok, etc. The behaviour described above appears to be system-wide.

I am unable to reproduce this issue in either the Tools > Configure Shortcuts menu item, or in System Settings > Keyboard & Mouse > Global Keyboard Shortcuts. In both cases it displayed correctly, and allowed me to set a Shortcut combination such as Meta + Ctrl + Alt + D.

This was done by selecting the global shortcut I wanted to change, selecting "Custom" then clicking none and inputting the key combination desired.