Graphics Administration Guide (July 2008)

can associate more than one key symbol with a modifier (such as Lock = Shift_R and
Lock = Shift_L), and you can associate more than one modifier with a key symbol (for
example, Control = Caps_Lock and Lock = Caps_Lock).
For example, on a PC-style keyboard, you can press Dto print a lower case "d", Shift
Dto print a capital "D", Alt Dto print something else, and Shift Alt Dto print still
something else.
The xmodmap client gives you the power to change the meaning of any key at any
time or to install a whole new key map for your keyboard.
examples
Suppose you frequently press the Caps Lockkey at the most inopportune moments.
You could remove the Caps Lockkey from the lock modifier, swap it for the f1 key,
then map the f1key to the lock modifier. Do this by creating a little swapper file that
contains the following lines:
!This file swaps the [Caps] key with the [F1] key.
remove Lock = Caps_Lock
keysym Caps_Lock = F1
keysym F1 = Caps_Lock
add Lock = Caps_Lock
Note the use of the ! in the file to start a comment line. To put your "swapper" file into
effect, enter the following on the command line:
xmodmap swapper
If you use such a swapper file, you should probably have an unswapper file. The
following file enables you to swap back to the original keyboard mapping without
having to exit X11:
!This file unswaps the [F1] key with the [Caps Lock] key.
remove Lock = Caps_Lock
keycode 88 = F1
keycode 55 = Caps_Lock
add Lock = Caps_Lock
Note the use of the hexadecimal values to reinitialize the keycodes to the proper key
symbols. You put your “unswapper” file into effect by entering the following command
line:
xmodmap unswapper
On a larger scale, you can change your current keyboard to a Dvorak keyboard by
creating a file with the appropriate keyboard mappings.
xmodmap .keymap
printing a key map
The -pk option prints a list of the key mappings for the current keyboard.
xmodmap -pk
52 X Server configuration details