Hi,

recently I've had the chance to fiddle with Unity and I quite liked some of the default keyboard shortcuts. In particular, the 'Meta' key is a keyboard shortcut for the Launcher.

Now, I am trying to reproduce the same behavior in KDE, i.e. press the Meta key to launch krunner, but I am not able to do it. It seems that Meta can be used only as a modifier (together with another key) and not as a 'standalone' shortcut. Is there a way to achieve my desired behaviour?

Thanks,
Matteo

As far as I know you would need to remap the Meta key (to e.g. F13), in which case it would stop working as a modifier key. Is this what you want?

Hans wrote:As far as I know you would need to remap the Meta key (to e.g. F13), in which case it would stop working as a modifier key. Is this what you want?

Not exactly. I would like to have the Meta key working both as a modifier key and as a standalone shortcut if it is pressed and released without any other key.

Unfortunately I don't know if that's possible with the KDE global shortcuts system.

It isn't possible. Or rather, it isn't possible in Qt, and KDE inherits this functionality from Qt. Qt has separate systems for tracking modifier key presses and other key presses, and it is not possible for a key to be both without breaking this system.

Is there any way to launch Kickoff Application Launcher plasmoid by double-tapping the Meta, and still use it as a modifier key?

No, because of how Qt handles modifiers this is not possible.

TheBlackCat wrote:No, because of how Qt handles modifiers this is not possible.

oh well...
thx for the info

Meta + Space is a good shortcut for that....

I use
meta + Space for run
meta + z for open menu
and meta + ~ for yakuake

danni wrote:Meta + Space is a good shortcut for that....

I use
meta + Space for run
meta + z for open menu
and meta + ~ for yakuake

i have it setup the same way (meta as the modifier)...
meta+z is yakuake for me
meta+f1 is menu
meta+f2 is run
meta+c for xkill
meta+h for home directory
meta+d for show desktop
meta+l for lock screen... and so on... just simple combos that i can remember easily

Sorry, I do know that I am posting very late.

Alt+F1 seems to do the trick. The default Kubuntu 19.10 panel's application launcher opens with Meta, and when I checked the configuration, it was mapped to Alt+F1. If you put in Alt+F1 in the config window for your shortcut, Meta should also be able to run it. I can still use Meta as a modifier key (Meta+T for KSysGuard).

I hope this helps.