[Resolved] Issues with keyboard losing its "shift".

[socratis]

I have several macros configured on my "gaming" aka "programming" keyboard. It seems that some of the "shifted" characters in the macros are being dropped when passed to the Solaris 11.3 VM.
This seems to have started with 5.2.4 and continues with 5.2.6.

It is not consistent on which "shifted" characters it loses the "shift".

When this happened using RDP to a regular windows physical box, I had to change where the keyboard combinations were handled to the local windows machine, instead of on the RDP host machine.
Is there a way to force the keyboard combinations to be handled on the VBox Host before passing to the VBox Guest OS?

[Guyver]

This continues to be an ongoing issue all the way through 5.2.10.

[JEBjames]

I've had the shift key problem on my laptop. But mainly (only?) when I use Synergy (keyboard/mouse sharing) to paste text from my desktop to my laptop. I assumed it was just a synergy glitch as typing the same thing on my laptop keyboard directly worked.

Can you give a specific example? i.e. what is the macro supposed to send, and what is it actually sending? Does it always sending it incorrectly?

[socratis]

Supposed to type

Code: Select all   Expand viewCollapse view

s_ur0P3

Ends up looking like

Code: Select all   Expand viewCollapse view

s_UR)P3
s-uR)P#
s_ur0P3
s_ur0P3
s_uR)P3
s-uR)P3
s-uR)P#
s-uR)P#
s_ur0P3
s-uR)P#
s-uR)P#
s-uR)P3
s-uR)P#
s-uR)P#
s_ur0P3
s_UR)P3
s-uR)P#
s-uR0P3
s_UR)P3
s-uR)P#
s_ur0P3
s-uR)P#
s-uR)P#
s_ur0P3
s-uR)P#
s-uR)P#
s_UR)P3
s-uR)P#
s_ur0P3
s-uR)P#
s-uR)P#
s_ur0P3
s-uR)PW


The same macro works fine inside RDP.

[socratis]

The same macro works fine inside RDP.

I'm not sure I understand what's going on here. Can you eliminate RDP from the equation and deal with the VM while sitting in front of the host?

I have several macros configured on my "gaming" aka "programming" keyboard.

Can you add a delay in between events? What's sending these macros to the VM? A background process (must be)? Something similar could happen with "VBoxManage", that's why I'm asking what's involved in the procedure.

when passed to the Solaris 11.3 VM.

Only on a Solaris VM? Have you tried anything else? If so, what were the results? Because I might have to move this to "Solaris Guests" then...

[socratis]

I only run a Solaris VM, with Solaris, I have no need for any other OS.

I can build out another VM to see if it is indeed Solaris or VBox itself.

The question I started with was how can we force VBox to interpret the keystrokes on the host side before passing them on to the VM?

[socratis]

how can we force VBox to interpret the keystrokes on the host side before passing them on to the VM?

You can't. With the exception of very few keystrokes like Alt+Ctrl+Del on Win/Linux, Cmd+Q/H on OSX, everything else gets unfiltered to the VM.

If you're into programming, see https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/KeyboardInput

[Guyver]

Interesting that there is another "shift" related issue reported with different guest OSes now.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=80400

Odds on related to my own as they report issues with single-shift or double-shift?

I do have automatic capture enabled since the guest additions allow the mouse to move in and out of the VM.

[andyp73]

Do you get the same result if you change the keyboard emulation mode? Fully shutdown the guest and run the following command:

VBoxManage modifyvm <uuid|vmname> --keyboard usb

Start the guest and see if the problem persists. If it does and you want to switch back to the normal mode then:

VBoxManage modifyvm <uuid|vmname> --keyboard ps2

-Andy.

[Guyver]

No change in the "symptoms" of the issue. The only thing I see different is that the keys are passed slower. Seeing individual keys appear, where when set to normal, they all sort of "pop up".

[Guyver]

Monkeying around with the macro editor, if I enable delay between keystrokes and add at least 1 millisecond between each keystroke, then there is no issue.
Once I get to 0 milliseconds, or turn delays off entirely, the problem crops up.

Timing issue on the keyboard interface/driver?

[socratis]

Timing issue on the keyboard interface/driver?

There is not a single human being that has 0 ms between keystrokes. There is a time delay added (can't remember how many ms off the top of my head, see https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/KeyboardInput), but this is definitely needed, because the keyboard buffer of several OSes just get overwhelmed with messages and they suffer a horrible, agonizing and painful death.

I did suggest the delay earlier, as it seemed that your keyboard buffer suffered from a flood of events that simply couldn't be processed.

if I enable delay between keystrokes and add at least 1 millisecond between each keystroke, then there is no issue.

Great, marking as [Resolved].

[Guyver]

Uh. No.

That is what's called a "workaround" , a "kludge", a "hack".

It won't be resolved until I can remove the delay and have it work.

[socratis]

Uh, yes. If you can find me a person that can type with 0 ms delay, I can tell you that it's a workaround. Or a keyboard buffer that can process a bunch of keyboard scan codes, when it wasn't designed to do that. Until then, and since VirtualBox includes a time delay so that keyboard press event can be processed accurately, I'd say you'd have to do the same. Even if it's programmatic...

Actually, come to think about it, especially if it's programmatic, because something like that can't happen in real life.

[socratis]

@Guyver

It might worth taking a look and/or commenting on ticket #17709...