Gnome & Slow Keys

By Michael Altfield, on September 24th, 2007

Who the fuck created “slow keys” for gnome? (rant)
Okay, so I’m on the phone with my bank–or rather, I’m on HOLD with my bank–and I’m at my ubuntu laptop. While I’m sitting there waiting for them to answer the phone (for THIR-TEEN minutes) with nothing better to do than bitch and complain about how terrible the volume normalization between quiet squeeze-your-ear-to-the-phone background music and the occasional deafeningly-loud “your call is important to us” interruptions, I realize my laptop’s keyboard has hair under the keys and needs to be cleaned (shut up, we all shed at least a little).

Perhaps I should have shutdown my computer for this, but I decided “what the hell,” and I started digging out the hair with a pair of tweezers. Now, during this process, I had several keys pressed down-up-down. Apparently one of which was the shift key.

Anyone who uses windows has been pissed off by the bullshit that is “Sticky Keys” and the annoying sounds they produce. Gnome has sticky keys too, but they are toggled with pressing shift 5 times in a row, and they don’t produce the stab-your-pc-speaker-with-a-very-sharp-screw-driver beeps. On the other hand, if you hold shift for a total of 8 seconds (as I did today), you’ll find you can toggle “Slow Keys” in Gnome. The result of which requires keys to be HELD down (as opposed to being pressed) for them to actually type anything.

Somehow, during my keyboard cleaning, I managed to activate Slow Keys without my knowledge. Since my typing did nothing, I assumed I had scratched an important bus connecting my laptop to my keyboard with my tweezers. FUCK, I BROKE IT! In a fit of rage, depression, and hope, I rebooted my computer. gdm gave me the happy flower screen, and I was able to type my username and password. YES! Soon as I logged in though, Slow Keys activated and rendered my keyboard useless yet again.

45 minutes of “fucking around with various X configurations” later, I somehow discovered that if I pressed a button down for a “while” it actually typed something. It wasn’t long after that when I discovered the villainous Slow Keys.

Sticky Keys, though I hate it, has a purpose. Someone out there, somewhere, might find it easier for them to type with Sticky Keys turned on. But the what practical use could come of Slow keys? Nothing. Fuck the Gnome developers for thinking up that bullshit idea.

/rant