Change default behavior of Fn+Funtion key

Question

I have the latest version of Ubuntu 14.04 installed on my Toshiba Satellite C55D-B5212.

All of the Fn key combinations work correctly except the brightness down and brightness up ones (Fn+F2 and Fn+F3). I installed the brightness indicator from https://launchpad.net/~indicator-brightness/+archive/ubuntu/ppa and added custom keyboard shortcuts to change the brightness.

However, when I entered Fn+F2 into the keyboard settings dialog, it came up as "Battery" and Fn+F3 came up as "Sleep". Pressing Fn+F3 puts the laptop to sleep and pressing Fn+F2 has no obvious effect.

Is there any way to get these key combinations to work the way I want?

Answer 1

I have exactly the same laptop and i had the same problem.

You must change the video card drivers. Go to Additional Drivers and select the option: "Using video driver for the AMD graphics accelerators from fglrx (proprietary)" and reboot the system

Then you have to program the keys. First install xdotool:

sudo apt-get install xdotool

Then open Keyboard from System Settings (Applications->System Tools->System Settings in Gnome).

Go to the Shortcut tab add press "+" to add the following shortcut:

Name: Brightness Up
Command: xdotool key XF86MonBrightnessUp

Click "Apply" then click on "Disabled" next to the new "Brightness Up" entry. Now press the key that corresponds to brightness up - F3 for me, but possibly F7 or something else for you.

Click "+" again and repeat the above steps to add the following entry for brightness down:

Name: Brightness Down
Command: xdotool key XF86MonBrightnessDown