UKBD(4) | Device Drivers Manual | UKBD(4)

# NAME

`ukbd` — USB keyboard support

# SYNOPSIS

`ukbd* at uhidev?`
`wskbd* at ukbd?`
`option UKBD_LAYOUT=XXX`

# DESCRIPTION

The `ukbd` driver provides support for USB keyboards i.e. HID devices in the “keyboard” class. Access to the keyboard is through the wskbd(4) driver.

The `ukbd` driver supports a number of different key mappings which can be chosen from with the kernel option “UKBD_LAYOUT” at compile time or with the utility wsconsctl(8) (variable: “keyboard.encoding”) at runtime. Other mappings can be used if the whole keymap is replaced by means of wsconsctl(8). The built-in mappings are at this time:

KB_BE
  (be) Belgium French.
KB_BR
  (br) Brazilian.
KB_CF
  (cf) Canadian French.
KB_DE
  (de) German with “dead accents”.
KB_DK
  (dk) Danish with “dead accents”.
KB_ES
  (es) Spanish.
KB_FR
  (fr) French.
KB_FR | KB_APPLE
  (fr.apple) French for Apple black USB keyboards.
KB_FR | KB_DVORAK
  (fr.dvorak) French keyboard with “Dvorak-Bepo” layout.
KB_HU
  (hu) Hungarian.
KB_IS
  (is) Icelandic with “dead accents”.
KB_IT
  (it) Italian.
KB_JP
  (jp) Japanese.
KB_LA
  (la) Latinamerican.
KB_LT
  (lt) Lithuanian in “ISO 8859-13”.
KB_LV
  (lv) Latvian
KB_NL
  (nl) Dutch with “dead accents”.
KB_NO
  (no) Norwegian with “dead accents”.
KB_PL
  (pl) Polish in “ISO 8859-2”.
KB_PT
  (pt) Portuguese.
KB_PT | KB_APPLE
  (pt.apple) Portuguese for Apple black USB keyboards.
KB_RU
  (ru) Russian in “KOI8”.
KB_SF
  (sf) Swiss French with “dead accents”.
KB_SG
  (sg) Swiss German with “dead accents”.
KB_SI
  (si) Slovenian.
KB_SV
  (sv) Swedish with “dead accents”.
KB_TR
  (tr) Turkish in “ISO 8859-9” with “dead accents”.
KB_UA
  (ua) Ukrainian in “KOI8”.
KB_UK
  (uk) British.
KB_US
  (us) English/US keyboard mapping (default).
KB_US | KB_COLEMAK
  (us.colemak) English/US keyboard with “Colemak” layout.
KB_US | KB_DVORAK
  (us.dvorak) English/US keyboard with “Dvorak” layout.

The KB_DE, KB_DK, KB_IS, KB_NO, KB_SF, KB_SG, KB_SV and KB_TR mappings can be used in the KB_NODEAD (.nodead) variant. This switches off the “dead accents”.

The KB_BE, KB_FR, KB_FR | KB_APPLE, KB_FR | KB_DVORAK, KB_JP, KB_UK, KB_US, KB_US | KB_DVORAK and KB_US | KB_COLEMAK mappings can be modified to swap the left Control and the Caps Lock keys by the KB_SWAPCTRLCAPS variant bit or the “.swapctrlcaps” suffix.

The KB_METAESC (.metaesc) option can be applied to any layout. If set, keys pressed together with the ALT modifier are prefixed by an ESC character. (Standard behaviour is to add 128 to the ASCII value.)

# EXAMPLES

To set a German keyboard layout without “dead accents” and sending an ESC character before the key symbol if the ALT key is pressed simultaneously, use `wsconsctl keyboard.encoding=de.nodead.metaesc`. To set it at kernel build time, add the following to the kernel configuration file:

    option UKBD_LAYOUT="(KB_DE|KB_NODEAD|KB_METAESC)"

# SEE ALSO

usbhidctl(1), intro(4), uhidev(4), usb(4), wskbd(4), wsconsctl(8)

# HISTORY

The `ukbd` driver appeared in NetBSD 1.4. OpenBSD support was added in OpenBSD 2.8.

# BUGS

The `ukbd` driver is brought into action rather late in the boot process, so if it is used as the console driver then ddb(4) is not usable until late in the boot.

The list of built-in mappings doesn't follow any logic. It grew as people submitted what they needed.

May 11, 2019 | Debian