mjhjmtu

I know that there are many questions on the internet about setting keyboard/mouse multimedia keys/buttons in Linux, nevertheless my question is more specific.

My wireless input devices:

• 
  Logitech K270 keyboard,


• 
  Logitech M510 mouse.

The above-mentioned keyboard has i.a.:

• volume up,


• volume down

keys which work fine. My mouse has few multimedia buttons which don't have assigned any actions. I want to assign to two mouse buttons, the same actions, which are assigned to the volume up/down keyboard keys.

Important note:

When I hold the volume up/down keyboard key down, the volume is
gradually getting louder/quieter until volume is maximum/muted. I want
the same effect with my mouse.

To fulfill above requirements I followed following steps:

1. I installed xvkbd, which is virtual keyboard for X window system,


2. I checked with xev what are the codes of mouse's buttons (8 - volume down, 9 - volume up),


3. 
   

   I added following lines to ~/.xbindkeysrc:

   
   
   

   "xvkbd -text '[XF86AudioLowerVolume]'"
    b:8
   
   "xvkbd -text '[XF86AudioRaiseVolume]'"
    b:9
   

   
   


4. 
   

   I brutally 'reloaded' xbindkeys daemon (actually I don't know if it can be called daemon because it starts from /etc/xdg/autostart):

   
   
   

   pkill -f xbindkeys && xbindkeys
   

   
   
   

   BTW: I don't know how to reload it gracefully.

   
   

and it almost works. Now I can turn the volume up/down with mouse buttons but if I keep holding volume up/down button, the volume is not getting gradually louder/quieter. It stops after one 'iteration'. I want 'auto-repeat' as long as I'm holding the button down.

Questions:

• How can I fix it?


• Is there any other way I can do it? For instance using only xmodmap, instead xvkbd + xbindkeys?

For the sake of completeness:

• 
  

  xmodmap result:

  
  
  

  abc@xyz:~$ xmodmap -pke | grep -i volume
  keycode 122 = XF86AudioLowerVolume NoSymbol XF86AudioLowerVolume NoSymbol XF86AudioLowerVolume
  keycode 123 = XF86AudioRaiseVolume NoSymbol XF86AudioRaiseVolume NoSymbol XF86AudioRaiseVolume
  

  
  



• Related commands: xmodmap, xev, showkeys, xbindkeys, xvkbd.



• Nice ArchWiki webpage about extra keyboard keys.


• All keysyms are defined in following header files: /usr/include/X11/keysymdef.h and here /usr/include/X11/XF86keysym.h.

$ sudo apt-get install xdotool
$ sudo apt-get install xbindkeys
$ vim ~/.xbindkeysrc

Contents:

# Sound Lower
"xdotool key XF86AudioLowerVolume"
 b:8

# Sound Louder
"xdotool key XF86AudioRaiseVolume"
 b:9

Save and close.

$ xbindkeys

This works for me. Logitech M500 on Ubuntu 14.04.

Some logitech mice have programmable buttons. Some of those have onboard storage to make profiles stored on the mouse. If you have access to a computer that can run Logitech's mouse setup software, you could make the mouse's USB keyboard component send multimedia-key presses (I think with autorepeat), instead of handling it in software on the GNU/Linux side.

For example, my G602 sends an F6 keypress when I press one of its buttons, even when I have it connected to my Linux desktop. Mice without onboard profile storage will only be able to have their buttons remapped by software (e.g. what you did, or Logitech's own software running under Windows).

IDK how to set up autorepeat for mouse buttons mapped to keyboard keys as you've done.

If you want the mouse buttons to act the same as the multimedia buttons on a keyboard, you have to emulate the keydown and keyup events as opposed to a one-shot keypress. Here's a quick script I use to set this up on my systems:

sudo apt install xdotool xbindkeys

echo "Setting up ~/.xbindkeysrc"
cat <<EOF >> ~/.xbindkeysrc
# Sound Lower
"xdotool keydown XF86AudioLowerVolume"
 b:8
"xdotool keyup XF86AudioLowerVolume"
 b:8 + release

# Sound Louder
"xdotool keydown XF86AudioRaiseVolume"
 b:9
"xdotool keyup XF86AudioRaiseVolume"
 b:9 + release
EOF

echo "Running xbindkeys"
xbindkeys

~

Optimal solution

"xdotool keydown XF86AudioLowerVolume"
b:8

"xdotool keyup XF86AudioLowerVolume"
b:8 + Release

"xdotool keydown XF86AudioRaiseVolume"
b:9

"xdotool keyup XF86AudioRaiseVolume"
b:9 + Release

This will behave as the keyboard keys as it will continue changing up/down the volume until you release the mouse button.

Happy coding...