Disable numlock, preserving mouse button key bindings
Based on @Michał Górny's answer. Here are the commands to disable num-lock, use numbers anyway, and map numlock to F13 (may be handy to bind to a special function in your window manager).
# NumLock is F13
xmodmap -e "remove mod2 = Num_Lock" \
-e "keycode 77 = F13"
# Use numbers even when numlock is off
xmodmap -e "keysym KP_End = KP_1" \
-e "keysym KP_Down = KP_2" \
-e "keysym KP_Next = KP_3" \
-e "keysym KP_Left = KP_4" \
-e "keysym KP_Begin = KP_5" \
-e "keysym KP_Right = KP_6" \
-e "keysym KP_Home = KP_7" \
-e "keysym KP_Up = KP_8" \
-e "keysym KP_Prior = KP_9" \
-e "keysym KP_Insert = KP_0" \
-e "keysym KP_Delete = KP_Decimal"
Its nice not to have the numlock light on all the time :)
Let's start with some explanation of what is happening and why your idea doesn't work. First, take a look at the modifier map:
$ xmodmap
xmodmap: up to 3 keys per modifier, (keycodes in parentheses):
shift Shift_L (0x32), Shift_R (0x3e)
lock Caps_Lock (0x42)
control Control_L (0x25), Control_R (0x69)
mod1 Alt_L (0x40), Meta_L (0xcd)
mod2 Num_Lock (0x4d)
mod3
mod4 Super_L (0x85), Super_L (0xce), Hyper_L (0xcf)
mod5 ISO_Level3_Shift (0x5c), Mode_switch (0xcb)
As you can see, Num_Lock
is mod2
here. When it is on, all keypress events come with mod2
bit on.
If you disable it like this:
$ xmodmap -e "keycode 77 = NoSymbol"
$ xmodmap
xmodmap: up to 3 keys per modifier, (keycodes in parentheses):
shift Shift_L (0x32), Shift_R (0x3e)
lock Caps_Lock (0x42)
control Control_L (0x25), Control_R (0x69)
mod1 Alt_L (0x40), Meta_L (0xcd)
mod2 BadKey (0x4d)
mod3
mod4 Super_L (0x85), Super_L (0xce), Hyper_L (0xcf)
mod5 ISO_Level3_Shift (0x5c), Mode_switch (0xcb)
Note that mod2
is now associated with BadKey
, and this seems to confuse Xorg a lot. In fact, most of modifier map changes seem to break X11 for me.
Right now, I can't find a good solution that involves playing with modifier map. But I have another idea: you can map all keypad keys to work the same with num lock both on and off. That is:
xmodmap -e "keysym KP_Up = KP_8"
xmodmap -e "keysym KP_Left = KP_4"
# ...
etc. Once you do that, the state of num lock will no longer matter.
You can even remove the modifier afterwards to turn the LED switching off:
xmodmap -e "remove mod2 = Num_Lock"