[mythtv-users] Airboard (LiteOn) SK-7100 keyboard

[W Gadsby]

Sorry, my browser seems to have removed the line breaks.  Here it is again with better formatting:


I'm trying to get an Airboard SK-7100 keyboard to work with mythtv.  It is an older one with a serial 
mouse interface which I have connected to /dev/ttyS0.  I'm running mythtv on a Fedora 11 system 
without Mythdora (hoping to install the latest Mythdora once it's out).  For anyone else trying to do 
this, or to use any serial mouse, I've discovered that Fedora no longer supports serial mice.  I think 
most other Linux distributions are similar.  There is a workaround.  Running the program inputattach 
at boot time tells the system not to lock out serial mice.  If this isn't run at boot time, there doesn't 
seem to be anything that can be done afterward to have the Xwindows system recognize the serial 
input.  What I did is added the following to rc.local:


/usr/sbin/inputattach --mouseman /dev/ttyS0 &

This allows the joystick on the Airboard to work as a serial mouse.  The keyboard works well and 
the mouse pointer itself works fine.  I've tried the different remote options in inputattach.  Type 
'inputattach --help' to get a list of available mice.  I can't seem to get the joystick buttons to work.  
I've also tried 'gpm -m /dev/ttyS0 -k <mousename>' with various different types to see if the system 
will recognize the buttons with no luck.  Does anyone have any experience with this?

Otherwise, the keyboard works great and has excellent range.  For step 2 I tried programming my 
Logitech Harmony 880 remote to send the Airboard commands.  When I use the Harmony remote, 
each key repeats three times.  The Airboard one is ok.  The Harmony remote obviously holds the 
keypress for too long.  I've played with the Harmony options and can only make the hold time longer.  
I went into the BIOS and changed the typematic repeat settings with no effect.  Linux seems to 
override them.  Then I found gnome-keyboard-properties.  I can increase the delay before keys 
repeat or even disable repeating entirely.  This seems to fix the problem if I bring up an xterm window.  
However, Mythfrontend doesn't seem to pay attention to the gnome settings and continues recognizing 
several keypresses each time I hit a key.

Does anyone know of a way to change the key repeat delay in Mythfrontend?  Any advice would be 
much appreciated.