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Does Your PC Really Need a SysRq Button Anymore?
An anonymous reader writes "Ever wondered what the SysRq key on your keyboard does? Lenovo has decided it's so rarely used that it has started removing the key from some new Thinkpad Edge laptops. We already know that Lenovo are something of the fastidious scientists when it comes to keyboard design. Last time they fiddled with the age-old key layout, it was after painstaking research to count exactly how many times users press the Delete and Escape keys. Now it seems another relic of computer keyboards is starting to disappear."
I don't recall ever using that key although I have coded my own "terminate and stay resident" (TSR) programs back then in order to achieve some level of multitasking in DOS.
With TSR programs, you could intercept the timer interrupt and do some amount of computation in the background before returning to the running program. You could also intercept the keyboard interrupt in order to switch from one application to another on the fly but I have never actually intercepted the Sysrq key. I used some other hot key combination definition. Maybe back then I though that it wasn't a good idea to fool around with that key but this page says other TSR programmers were using it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_request
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
Ever wondered what the SysRq key on your keyboard does?
Introduced by IBM with the PC/AT, it was intended to be available as a special key to directly invoke low-level operating system functions with no possibility of conflicting with any existing software.
In Linux, the kernel can be configured to provide functions for system debugging and crash recovery.[4] This use is known as the "Magic SysRq key".
Microsoft has used SysRq for various OS- and application-level debuggers. In the CodeView debugger, it was sometimes used to break into the debugging during program execution.[5] For the Windows NT remote kernel debugger, it can be used to force the system into the debugger.[6]
So it's a handy debugger key for those who need one, functioning in the same key as print screen, but you need to hold alt key. What's the harm having it there, since it already is? It's not like it's an extra button on your keyboard.
I'm pretty sure SysRq is a left over from the terminal days, though I don't recall which terminal (the VT100 doesn't have it). It was basically the equivalent of CTRL-ALT-DEL.
Ahh, Wiki to the rescue; it was from the IBM 3270.
When I learned to type we didn't have these extra "one" and "zero" keys. We used lower case "ell" and upper case "Oh" and we were happy, dang it!
On my laptop, I use it to toggle VMs. It's perfect because on my machine, it does absolutely nothing. Double scroll lock is the next best bet for me, but my keyboard requires me to press the Fn key simultaneously.
Is Lenovo leaving any "useless" keys? Some of us actually NEED keys that are otherwise never used and the OSes recognize by default.
"You can have my SysRq key when you pry it from my cold dead ThinkPad!"
I use the "busier" backwards or "reisub" combination with the sysrq key in order to gently shutdown Ubuntu when it locks up. So yes, I use it, but that has only been in the last couple of years or so. Not sure what else it is used for...
Like a city whose walls are broken down is a man who lacks self-control.
randomly I noticed that key earlier today, because some people have been given new usb keyboards instead of PS2 and they dont have that key (hp keyboards).... and now it appears here...
Weird.
- http://www.milkme.co.uk
If linux freezes, then Alt-SysRq-S+U+B will do an emergency sync of the disks, unmount them and reboot the system.
That is the Print Screen key. Don't ever remove that key from the keyboard! I don't care that the word "SysRq" is written below "Print Screen" on that key. Feel free to remove that "SysRq" word from there, but do NOT remove the handy print screen key! Thanks.
I use the Caps Lock for entering software serial numbers where you get a long string of capital letters and numbers.
It's the eject key.
As far as I'm concerned, the 101-key keyboard layout was handed down from on high by the FSM, and anyone who changes it should be boiled in oil.
(Yes, this includes whoever was responsible for Windows keys, which I'm still pissed about 15 years later.)
I don't know, but having different keys for backspace and delete on mine would be very nice...
"Ever wondered what the SysRq key on your keyboard does?"
No - since I own a Mac....you insensitive bork........
I keep seeing these, and I wonder how long it will be until we have nothing but a blackberry style keyboard.
I guess I can't complain since I still use my Model M and LK463 keyboards, but laptops are getting to the point that the function keys are all remapped to random tasks (brightness, volume, etc) and we keep seeing random multi-media keys... yet stuff like num lock, scroll lock, print screen, break is getting pulled.
Maybe most suits don't spend anytime dealing with text? Powerpoint doesn't recognize break?
An operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.
That is the Print Screen key. Don't ever remove that key from the keyboard! I don't care that the word "SysRq" is written below "Print Screen" on that key. Feel free to remove that "SysRq" word from there, but do NOT remove the handy print screen key! Thanks.
But if we drop the sysrq key we'll finally have room for the any key.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Reading through the discussion I looked down to remind myself where on my keyboard it was, only to find that my Logitech keyboard I've been using at work for the last 2 years doesn't even have a Syr rq key.
My work laptop does though as an alternative on the delete key.
Still, I didn't even realised it'd gone from my main keyboard!!
The people in the market segment for the Lenovo Laptops probably don't need the SysRq button (nor Print Screen). I'm fairly sure you could remove a bunch of other buttons they don't need beyond that one to. 12 function keys? the "Scroll Lock" and "Pause/Break" probably doesn't do much either - but they might already be gone.
The question is what are you going to replace them with? I don't really need a shortcut button to check my email or whatever either. Plus removing keys and moving them around really screws up the layout and has a serious negative impact on my type-speed.
If this change is indicative of what'll happen to the "serious business" series (T, X, R), then the ThinkPad has, after some 18 years or so, finally jumped the shark.
One of the main selling points of a ThinkPad was the keyboard. When all the other brands went completely nuts and placed the PrtSc/ScrLk/Pause/Insert/Delete/Home/End/PgUp and PgDn keys at a whim, on a ThinkPad you could blindly hit the spot where the key was supposed to be and actually hit it. They were quite proud of that, and nobody minded.
Now, you get a chiclet keyboard with the F-keys disabled by default and six rows. Well, congrats Lenovo, you've just went from top-of-the-line in 2010 to consumer-grade-sony-vaio in 1999 or so.
Another thing were the displays. Great, high-resolution, matte 4:3 screens one could work with. I own a 12" X61 with 1050 horizontal lines. Nowadays, it's WXGA with less than 800 lines in everything up to 14.1", and half of the models come in glare-type finish. Thanks to the shiny finish you can't see the screen contents anyways, so that slightly mitigates the lack of resolution.
What's next, Lenovo? Get rid of the high-quality finish of the Notebooks and switch to cheap plastic? Fuck up the support infrastructure IBM built? Oh wait, already happened. I guess it's down to the nipple mouse as the last true hallmark of a ThinkPad. And that, I won't give up 'til you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
If you look at the pictures in TFA, you'll note that they've moved Print Screen to share space with the Insert key. To invoke Print Screen instead of Insert, you have to hold down the Fn key.
cp /dev/zero ~/signature.txt
that the user is pressing the SysRq key.
In fact, to *urgently* tell the OS that the SysRq. It's not supposed to be buffered or anything, it supposed to grab the OS by the collar and scream "THE USER JUST PRESSED THE DAMMNED SYSRQ KEY!!!!" at it.
But what is that supposed to mean?
It doesn't mean anything.
That's the whole point.
When they were designing the keyboard, they thought of all the things that you might want a keyboard to say ("STOP SCROLLING", "Show me that last page", "Get me the hell out of this input mode"). And after they'd mandated keys for everything anybody could think of, they had a stroke of genius. They mandated a key that did nothing anybody wanted to do.
Why is that a stroke of genius?
It is something rare in engineering, which thrives on bravado and feverishly inflated self-confidence. It is an admission of the limitation of human foresight, an acknowledgement that there are more things under Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in our philosophies; a semiotic *memento mori*.
This key is mandated to mean nothing, therefore it can mean anything, or indeed, everything.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Ditto. Alt+PrtScn is your current-dialog-capturing-friend!
Although, it still amazes me the amount of people who still install 'freeware' utilities to take screengrabs of dialogs, when Windows has had that functionality built in for many versions... ... and I kid you not, I did once have this conversation:
User: I need Photoshop CS2 installed, here's my Cost-Code.
Me: Why?
User: I write documentation that needs screenshots.
Me: You know you can screengrab via windows and paste directly into Word?
User: I don't care, Bob has Photoshop, and I want a copy as well.
Me: *sigh* Ok, I'll buy a copy and charge your dept...
-Jar
Together, We Can Make Slashdot Better. I Do NOT Mod ACs. - Check Me Out
I don't care about SysRq but I don't mind it sharing space with PrintScreen. And don't you dare taking my PrintScreen.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
They would do better to remove the CAPS LOCK key, which is more bulky and - as far as I know - useful only to morons who don't know how to keep from SHOUTING on the internet. If CAPS LOCK functionality is really needed, they could just allow holding the Shift key for a period longer than t(x). The SysRq key is both the same key as "Print Screen" which is often used and useful, and is a major component of debugging for the most used operating system in the server market (Linux). (Bear in mind that the kernel that runs on those servers gets developed on laptops and desktop workstations, not servers.)
As a Linux developer this move screams to me: "HEY! WE'RE LENEVO, AND NOW THAT WE HAVE BOUGHT THE RIGHTS TO THE THINKPAD NAME FROM IBM, WE ARE SHOUTING HOW CLUELESS WE ARE BECOMING FROM THE VIRTUAL ROOFTOPS".
This is NOT their father's Thinkpad.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
You can use numlock and the accessibility feature to use the number pad as a mouse, I do that with my wireless keyboard as using a wireless mouse on furniture sucks.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
I'm looking down at my vanilla Logitech keyboard and I don't see any key with "SysRq" on it.
So I guess I don't need one.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Rebind it to CTRL and learn to love the CAPS key
http://johnhaller.com/jh/useful_stuff/disable_caps_lock/
Frankly, there are a lot of keys we could get rid of, because they just take up real estate and don't help with the way I use the keyboard. I rarely have rekwirements to use the Q key, and I'm kwite sure that others could get by without it, too. These key-friendly users just need to akwire new work habits. What's hard about that?
cool, can we now have ctrl+alt+backspace to restart the xserver back in x.org please?
one of the main arguments was that we could use the never-working sysrq+blahblha combination to do the same thing..
But how will a psychiatrist diagnose their patient then?
They just need to ask the user to press any key...
space bar - penile size complex.
ctrl - control freak
esc - escapism
alt - schizophrenia
shift - split personality
enter - vaginal fixation
F1 - overgrown ambition.
num enter - anal fixation
num zero - low self esteem
menu key - bulimic
tab - drunkard
backslash - paranoia
caps lock - Tourette's
delete - destructive
arrow up - mania
arrow down - depression
windows key - suicidal tendencies
reset - hopeless idiot.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
One major ilk I have about laptop keyboard is the positioning of the CTRL and Fn keys.
I was in a shop recently that sold laptops of many different brands. All of them, except Lenovo, had the CTRL key as the first key in the row, with the Fn key to the right of it. This, IMHO, is the correct position for it - it's where my little finger automatically goes for CTRL, and where it is located on a 'normal' keyboard.
Lenovo had the Fn key first, with the CTRL key to the right, meaning that when you go to hit CTRL-, I hit Fn instead. This, for me, is a major factor is choosing what laptop to buy - if the CTRL key is in the wrong place, it's marked off the list immediately.
funny story:
Several years ago, for work, I got a Compaq Evo N620c (which I still use for work). While the Fn and CTRL keys are in the wrong place, at least they have the forethought to allow you to swap them in the BIOS, which I naturally did.
Now, the laptop was to be reburned, so the Service Desk took it in. When I went to pick it up the next day, they had a normal keyboard plugged into the PS/2 socket. I asked them why, and they told me that the CTRL key was broken and they couldn't use CTRL-ALT-DEL (yes, it's Windows. *sigh*)
So firstly I explained to them that the CTRL and Fn keys were swapped in the BIOS, and then asked the question "Why didn't you just use the CTRL key on the other side of the keyboard?" (which, when tried, worked perfectly).
*sigh*
T.
does Alt+PrtSc allow you to manually select any *section* of screen ?
didn't think so..
LOL
just WIN+R pbrush[ENTER] CTRL+V
And use your mouse to select any section of the screen.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
I don't know why, but the windows computer at my job does the Copy with CONTROL + INSERT and the Paste with SHIFT + INSERT, weird, I know... It's Windows XP, I could change it if I wanted, but I've just get used to it, tho at home I use the common ctrl-c, ctrl-v....
The real problem? This laptop has one of those horrible chiclet keyboards.
Lenovo argues the new design gives the laptop a more "clean and inviting look"
I don't want to use any keyboard where the look of the thing was given anything more than secondary consideration. I've used chiclet-keys on Powerbooks, and I hate them. And the stupid key layout. I understand that compromises have to be made on a laptop keyboard because of space, but the Powerbook keyboard seems to have been solely designed to "think different" from the standard layout. Thou Shalt Not Move The Slash Keys. Whenever I know I have to support one now, I take my USB keyboard with me, a nice Cherry G80-3000 with a boring, normal, sensible layout, and clicky key switches.
I don't even bother with that anymore. If you have it, OneNote puts a better screengrabber into Windowkey+S which lets you select the part of the screen that you want to capture (no more cropping!)
I managed to get that part of OneNote working on Ubuntu as well, although through the tray icon instead of the hotkey. Unfortunately most everything else that I need in OneNote remains broken under the version of CrossOver I have.
You can accomplish anything you set your mind to. The impossible just takes a little longer.
Is there a good reason Fn+Alt+Ins can't still function as SysRq?
You can use ALT-F4 instead - try it now.
AT&ROFLMAO
Since Lenovo is remapping the PrintScreen function to be an alternate of the Insert key, you'll still have print screen.
There's a picture of the keyboard in the article, and it does seem relatively well laid-out. Page-up and page-down look a tad clumsy, but are logically placed in relation to the arrow keys at least.
I think my biggest objection would be the reintroduction of the chiclet keys, but then again I suppose those are easier to seal and clean, so I guess there's a good argument for them. I just hope for Lenovo's sake they haven't screwed up the keyboard play and made the chiclets feel like the old mushtastic keys on the TRS-80, which is the last time I dealt with chiclets and I hated them.
What I don't understand is, if they have the "fn" key there anyway, why not remap SysRq to Fn-Tab, or Fn-Tilde, or something? Of course, then they'd have the problem that most of the "magic SysRq functions" in Linux are done with normal keys and having Fn pushed to get to SysRq could mess with that, I suppose.
"This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
SysRQ can be extremely useful in figuring out why a machine has locked up or become unresponsive...
http://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/sysrq.txt
Omeganon
Comment removed based on user account deletion
For the love of $deity, but the CTRL key back where it frakkin' belongs, next to the frakkin' A key!
Seriously. CTRL-key combo's are much easier to press, while touch typing, when the CTRL key is just to the left of the A key.
Cheers,
RM
Nobody's as dumb, as I appear to be
Winkey is very useful.
I have a ton of tiny shell scripts invoked by Win + $key (via xbindkeys):
"Grey+" / "Grey -" -- volume control
G -- google current selection (see xclip (1))
W -- search Wikipedia (or Russian wikipedia with shift)
A -- open terminal
K -- invoke xkill (1)
L -- lock screen
and some more
On the other hand, the invenror of the Insert key deserves a mousetrap being put right under the light switch in their room.
WYSIWIG, but what you see might not be what you need
Actually, I've been using a lot of 3270 emulators on various operating systems since Windows 3.11, and I have yet to see a single one that actually uses the physical SysRq key to mean SysRq. The old DOS ones did, but anything in Windows really can't, because SysRq causes a local interrupt that's harder to intercept. It's easier for emulator programmers to capture a less invasive keypress and simulate SysRq over the 3270 stream.
My current 3270 emulator uses CTRL-ESC to emulate SysRq. I've seen a few others used as well. Actually, since the ESC key is meaningless over the 3270 screen, ESC itself is the ATTN/ClearError/ClearBuffer key.
It's rather like the problem some operating systems have when using a remote desktop (VNC, Remote Control, etc). If you press CTRL-ALT-DEL, the emulator generally can't send that to the remote session because CTRL-ALT-DEL just caused a priority OS interrupt on the local machine and, depending on how your local OS handles CTRL-ALT-DEL, it may be rebooting. :)
So most remote control software has a little button or control that says "send CTRL-ALT-DEL to remote".
"This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
I love the keyboard on my 2.5 year old thinkpad. Especially the dedicated "back" and "forward" buttons, which I've remapped to more useful functions. In fact, I think the keyboard is almost a "killer feature" that none of their competitors can match. If they start removing buttons I use, I may be able to make my next laptop a system76 or clevo.
A cat can't teach a dog to bark.
I'm seeing a market for a USB SysRq key - just a single key with a rotatable USB connector on it.
But it doesn't need it's own special key. Any combination of keys could be programmed to send the PRTSCR keycode, without needing a dedicated key.
Also true for every other key. In fact, you could just have one key and if you keep hitting it it cycles through all of the keycodes until you get to the one you want. Then you pause and go on to the next one. Seems very elegant to me. Put the most-used characters at the front of the list: etaoin...
Intron: the portion of DNA which expresses nothing useful.
My Asus Travelmate has an key and a $ key. I'm still wondering what to do with them. I really don't know what went through their minds when they decided "HEY! Let's put a $ key!", like shift-4 wasn't enough.
You're hired! - Steve Jobs
And why stop there? Lenovo has also asked itself how often users press the F Function keys. On the new laptops, the F Function buttons are reduced to secondary controls, in place of laptop controls like screen brightness. Now, you'll need to hold the Fn button to use keys like F11 (while screen brightness can be pressed without holding Fn).
Now that is a dumb decision. I use function keys all the time, and having to hold some other key for them to work would definitely be a dealbreaker. My Microsoft keyboard has an "F Lock" key which is like the Fn key but toggleable (think Caps Lock instead of Shift). That's a much better design.
Used it a lot on my desktop when I hacked some scanner drivers to support my parallel port scanner. It is amazing the light show that a "simple" null pointer deference in your kernel driver can make. : )
Also use it a lot to force buffers to flush to the disk and then remount the root filesystem as readonly. This was very useful to prevent disk corruption while I was debugging my ACPI suspend function on the laptop. For some reason (Microsoft ASL compiler) when the laptop was resuming from suspend state, the laptop LCD didn't turn on.
I also noticed that some laptops have SYSRQ as a function (fn key). That way one has to press:
fn+sysrq+ however, things start to be funny when these laptop also have a numeric keyboard available as second function in the {u, i, o, j, k, l, m} keys.
For example: fn+i gives key 5.
Now imagine fn+sysrq+u , one wanted a sysrq with command 'u' (remount root as ro I think), but will get a sysrq with command 5 (change log level I think). Yikes!
Consequently I will not be purchasing a Thinkpad Edge. I've had to reboot a redhat machine repeatedly with the magic sysreq keys lately. Just throwing this useful key away is a mistake. I don't understand what it benefits them anyway, since it's just some extra silkscreen on an existing button that does see use and another scan code in their hardware.
Reminds me of that "Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard" story from The Onion. http://www.theonion.com/content/video/apple_introduces_revolutionary?utm_source=embedded_video
Jeez, how many serial numbers do you type per day that you need a special key on your keyboard just to make typing serial numbers easier? Is you job title "Serial Number Entry Technician?"
While hooked up to a time share in the mid 70's, I wanted to know what the key did. I kept pounding it. After a few minutes, my display responded with ****STOP RINGING THAT DAMN BELL*****. Seems a large clanging bell in the server room, miles away, was hooked up so the System Admin could respond to requests from the user.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.