CODEWITHSUNDEEP
keyboardkeyboard-shortcutsxdotool
letFunny
letFunny

Reputation: 31

Map key sequence of more than two keys

I have created and script that uses xdotool to open new tabs in specific firefox containers. I need to map three keys, for instance ctrl+y+p to open a personal container, ctrl+y+b to open the banking container and so on. I cannot find a tool that lets you map more than two keys.

Is there something like what I have described?

Thanks a lot.

Edit: For anyone looking for an answer, I found a way. I use i3 so I just added a mode triggered by pressing the first two keys and then mapped the "b" to the command + escape (to exit the mode).

Upvotes: 3

Views: 3316

Answers (1)

Santi Pérez
Santi Pérez

Reputation: 370

Install xdotool if you haven't already done so, for example:

sudo apt-get install xdotool

As per your example (CTRL+y+p), execute:

DISPLAY=:0 xdotool keydown ctrl keydown y keydown p

Which presses the three keys but does not release them after. An alternative way:

DISPLAY=:0 xdotool key ctrl+y+p

:0 is a typical value for the display, but in my Raspberry Pi, for example, it needed to be DISPLAY=:10. If you are still having trouble with the display variable and get a message like this:

xdotool can't open display (null)

then you could obtain the display value with: 

ps -u $(id -u) -o pid= | \
    while read pid; do
        cat /proc/$pid/environ 2>/dev/null | tr '\0' '\n' | grep '^DISPLAY=:'
    done | grep -o ':[0-9]*' | sort -u

Another alternative way to obtain DISPLAY values (it will be the number after the ':' )

xauth list

This works in raspbian too:

w -hs | awk '{print $3}' | sort -u | grep -v -

Good luck

Upvotes: 2

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