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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.
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 don't know, but having different keys for backspace and delete on mine would be very nice...
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
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.
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
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?
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.
Print screen is tool for terrorists and pirates! You could copy all 15 hours of the extended edition of lord of the rings by using print screen on each frame of film and saving it all to uncompressed bitmaps.[/humor]
You can use ALT-F4 instead - try it now.
AT&ROFLMAO
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
You're hired! - Steve Jobs
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.
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