Keyboard multimedia support

[woohoomoo]

I've always thought that VLC was missing the ability to make use of the multimedia keys on some keyboards, so I bring this topic to your attention in the hope that the development team is able to map the keys to VLC.

As an example, I have a Saitek Eclipse II keyboard. It has fast forward and rewind buttons, play/pause, and stop. Works fine in Windows Media Player, but they are useless in VLC. Just seems a shame that VLC doesnt make use of the multimedia buttons on keyboards.

[CloudStalker]

Fixed in next version.

[woohoomoo]

Excellent news! Not sure what the general policy is on asking, but is there any ETA on the next version which will include this feature?

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

Excellent news! Not sure what the general policy is on asking, but is there any ETA on the next version which will include this feature?

When it is ready!

[dionoea]

Ahem, I added the multimedia key support in the development version a long time ago and it made it in the stable branch on August 31 2006. So it definitively should be in 0.8.6c. You need to bind the keys to something useful in the preferences before being able to use them. AFAIK, they work fine when focus is on the video output or on the skins2 interface, they don't when the wxWidgets (default) interface has focus. I believe that jb added support for those in the new Qt interface for 0.9.0.

[DGMurdockIII]

if we have to add them i dont see where or how i see how to change hotkeys but not to add the play or stop buttons that are on your keyboard

[AndyMan1]

Brand new here, so forgive me if this deserves another thread etc.

On the topic of keyboard support, is there any reason why VLC doesn't have the numpad mapped? Can it *please* be mapped?

I've got (an admittedly kooky) setup where I am using a wireless numpad as a "remote,"

I was really hoping to map out the numpad so 4 skips back, 6 skips forward, 8 volume up, 2 volume down, 5 pause, etc. But no option was available for that.

I've dug around looking for answers, finally found myself in vlc_keys.h and it looks like no numeric keys are defined in the first place.

So any chance this can be added into the next release?

if not, any guesses as to whether the mapping is dirt simple ({ "1", '1' },{ "2", '2' },etc.) or requires a special hex code, so I can compile it myself?

[CloudStalker]

if we have to add them i dont see where or how i see how to change hotkeys but not to add the play or stop buttons that are on your keyboard

Here's how you change hotkeys: Select VLc media player and the go to Tools > Preferences > Interface > Hotkeys settings > (check the "Advanced options" box) select the key you want to assign (play/puase for example) Then from the drop-list on the far right corner, scroll down and select the media key you want to assign.

[DGMurdockIII]

i did it right but its still kinda buggy BTW i have a zbord if that has any problems with it

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

Brand new here, so forgive me if this deserves another thread etc.

On the topic of keyboard support, is there any reason why VLC doesn't have the numpad mapped? Can it *please* be mapped?

I've got (an admittedly kooky) setup where I am using a wireless numpad as a "remote,"

I was really hoping to map out the numpad so 4 skips back, 6 skips forward, 8 volume up, 2 volume down, 5 pause, etc. But no option was available for that.

I've dug around looking for answers, finally found myself in vlc_keys.h and it looks like no numeric keys are defined in the first place.

So any chance this can be added into the next release?

if not, any guesses as to whether the mapping is dirt simple ({ "1", '1' },{ "2", '2' },etc.) or requires a special hex code, so I can compile it myself?

laptops?

[AndyMan1]

Brand new here, so forgive me if this deserves another thread etc.

On the topic of keyboard support, is there any reason why VLC doesn't have the numpad mapped? Can it *please* be mapped?

I've got (an admittedly kooky) setup where I am using a wireless numpad as a "remote,"

I was really hoping to map out the numpad so 4 skips back, 6 skips forward, 8 volume up, 2 volume down, 5 pause, etc. But no option was available for that.

I've dug around looking for answers, finally found myself in vlc_keys.h and it looks like no numeric keys are defined in the first place.

So any chance this can be added into the next release?

if not, any guesses as to whether the mapping is dirt simple ({ "1", '1' },{ "2", '2' },etc.) or requires a special hex code, so I can compile it myself?

laptops?

what about them?

[DGMurdockIII]

It not a laptop it a USB keyboard Called a Zboard here is the website for the keyboard http://www.ideazon.com/us/products/zboa ... yboard.asp

[jacksnodgrass]

I can't get this to work either....
I have:
VLC media player 0.8.6c
USB Multimedia Keyboard with play/pause, next, previous, and stop buttons

I can go into gnome-keybinding-properties and gnome 'sees' my keys... I've mapped
them to the play/pause, next, previous and stop actions....

I can start VLC ( and go to the skins2 interface ) and get to the 'hotkey' seetings, but
if I manually select "Media Stop", "Media Play Pause" etc, my keys on my keyboard
do not have any effect. I can not use those keys to select the option from the
pulldown box. I'd prefer that when I selected the hotkey for 'stop' that I'd just
press the 'stop' key on my keyboard and vlc would read that key and use that
for the stop.... not sure where the 'Multimedia Stop' value is supposed to map
to my keyboard stop key.....

anyway... I think I've done what VLC wants... but it doesn't work.

jack

[lwc]

I don't get it either. Why does it ignore my settings if I choose any of the multimedia buttons?!

Just like MPC, it should automatically support multimedia buttons. Also, MPC has a whole field just for "Application Commands" in addition to regular buttons. In VLC I have to, say, stop using "space" for play/pause if favor of the multimedia buttons (had they worked).

P.S.
Another issue is that I have to restart VLC so hotkeys settings would take effect (not that it helps with multimedia buttons).

[DGMurdockIII]

same issue

[DGMurdockIII]

http://www.codeguru.com/cpp/w-p/system/ ... 5655/#more

[akagambit]

I just bought a new HP Pavilion dv6000 and found the media keys don't work...honestly I am surprised that some kind of media key plugin has not been made for VLC the code is obviously out there to do it since there has been user made plugins for Foobar2000, Winamp and iTunes. I dunno what it is with VLC's media key functions but they don't work on any PC or laptop I use them with but maybe its just me...maybe I just don't know what I am talking about but it seems easy to me...

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

Try development versions.

[chuan0309]

I have try to modify the code in VLC and remap the multimedia keys in Linux Ubuntu. Below is what I done:

* In Linux, create a file (~/.Xmodmap) to execute xmodmap expressions with following content:

Code: Select all

keycode 130 = XF86HomePage keycode 144 = XF86AudioPrev keycode 152 = XF86Launch4 keycode 153 = XF86AudioNext keycode 160 = XF86AudioMute keycode 162 = XF86AudioPause keycode 164 = XF86AudioStop keycode 174 = XF86AudioLowerVolume keycode 176 = XF86AudioRaiseVolume keycode 177 = keycode 180 = XF86Launch3

* In VLC source code, add following codes in ../include/vlc_keys.h:

Code: Select all

#define KEY_MEDIA_FASTER 0x002d0000 #define KEY_MEDIA_SLOWER 0x002e0000 … … { "Media Prev Track", KEY_MEDIA_PREV_TRACK }, { "Media Stop", KEY_MEDIA_STOP }, { "Media Play Pause", KEY_MEDIA_PLAY_PAUSE } { "Media Play Pause", KEY_MEDIA_PLAY_PAUSE }, { "Media Faster", KEY_MEDIA_FASTER }, { "Media Slower", KEY_MEDIA_SLOWER }

* Beside, add following codes in modules/gui/skins2/x11/x11_loop.cpp as well:

Code: Select all

#include <X11/XF86keysym.h> ... ... keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_AudioMute] = KEY_VOLUME_MUTE; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_AudioLowerVolume] = KEY_VOLUME_DOWN; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_AudioRaiseVolume] = KEY_VOLUME_UP; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_AudioNext] = KEY_MEDIA_NEXT_TRACK; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_AudioPrev] = KEY_MEDIA_PREV_TRACK; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_AudioStop] = KEY_MEDIA_STOP; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_AudioPause] = KEY_MEDIA_PLAY_PAUSE; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_Launch3] = KEY_MEDIA_FASTER; keysymToVlcKey[XF86XK_Launch4] = KEY_MEDIA_SLOWER;

As a result, with vlc command in terminal,
vlc --key-play-pause 'Media Play Pause' --key-stop 'Media Stop' --key-vol-up 'Volume Up' --key-vol-down 'Volume Down' --key-vol-mute 'Volume Mute' --key-slower 'Media Prev Track' --key-faster 'Media Next Track' ../movie.mpg

The play/pause, mute, volume up, volume down, next track and previous track can work. However, stop, fast forward and back rewind cannot work.

Any idea ?

[AmishSlayer]

Ok, I got the keyboard media buttons to work. However, the reason I use these is to control my music/videos while I'm playing a game. The keyboard media buttons don't work unless I have VLC focused.

Is there a way to get these media buttons to work while VLC is in the background?

Thanks.

[VLC_help]

Currently it seems that VLC doesn't support Global hotkeys, hopefully someone will fix this in future.

[CloudStalker]

Currently it seems that VLC doesn't support Global hotkeys, hopefully someone will fix this in future.

Well technically VLC doesn't officially support Global Hotkeys, yet, but someone is working on it, really, has already worked on it.
ssbssa's plug-in

[gitaarik]

but i ques global hotkeys for mac os x is still not possible?

[nilbus]

I did what jacksnodgrass and got the same results. I'm on a Dell XPS M1330 laptop using Ubuntu Linux with multimedia keys that work in other gnome apps like Totem and Rhythmbox.

[n3twork]

I have on a win xp box vlc 0.9.x and I figured it didn't work but if you go in hotkey settings (I'm using advanced view) and you double click in the shortcut column another window comes up and it does properly capture the global multimedia keys as opposed to the set button which doesn't. This new window must be how they worked around the main window not grabbing it hope this helps people.