Can't adjust volume via function keys

[babythem]

Running AVL-MXE (MX 19.4, AVL 10.11, 64-bit) with Xfce 4.14.3 on a Dell Inspiron 13.

The "volume" designated function keys on my machine aren't doing what they're supposed to do: F1 should un/mute sound, F2 should lower volume, and F3 should increase volume. (They did these things when I was running Linux Mint on the same machine.) However, my other function keys do work --- eg. the "screen brightness" keys (F11 and F12) do indeed adjust screen brightness, the keyboard backlighting key (F10) works, and the PrtScr key takes screenshots, etc.

How can I troubleshoot this? It's quite annoying having to open up PulseAudio Volume Control whenever I want to adjust my system sound volume! I don't know how to figure out if those function keys are mapped to some other function that I'm not aware of. My keyboard model (in settings Keyboard > Layout) is set to Generic 105-key PC (intl.) --- changing this to any other Generic layout or even the Dell layouts didn't fix the problem.

Thanks for the help!

[Huckleberry Finn]

Assuming we're talking about Fn + F.. ( Fn+F1 etc.. ) otherwise it's easy to be a conflict just for F1 , F2 , F3 ...

You can see the default shortcuts in "Keyboard" from Menu, "Application Shortcuts" tab.

But imho it must be related to kernel, say, 4.9 is good for this old laptop but the brightness keys don't work. But when you change kernel to 4.19 or 5.x etc, they begin working .. Or sometimes it's the touchpad for other users, and so on ..

So, you can try different kernels from MX Package Installer . (We don't know the current situation as there's no "Quick System Info" posted)

[manyroads]

You can (if you wish) map to any keys to perform the function via keybindings. FWIW here's what I use; it requires pamixer be installed (because my laptop is not happy to use the standard linux bindings). The keys, in your case,would be modified in your xfce4 keyboard tool.

Code: Select all

#Volume Control
XF86AudioLowerVolume
	 pamixer --decrease 5 && notify-send "Volume    (Down)" -u low -t 5000 
XF86AudioRaiseVolume
	 pamixer --increase 5 && notify-send "Volume    (Up)" -u low -t 5000 
XF86AudioMute
	 pamixer --toggle-mute && notify-send "Sound    (Toggle)" -u low -t 5000 

Here are some guides:
https://docs.xfce.org/xfce/xfce4-settings/keyboard
https://www.addictivetips.com/ubuntu-li ... the-xfce4/

Remember when all else fails, look for documentation. :lipsrsealed:

[babythem]

Thanks for the help! Here's that quick system info, sorry about that:

Code: Select all

Snapshot created on: 20201203_1342
System:    Host: <filter> Kernel: 5.9.1-rt20avl1 x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: N/A 
           parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.9.1-rt20avl1 
           root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet threadirqs noresume 
           Desktop: Xfce 4.14.3 tk: Gtk 3.24.5 info: xfce4-panel wm: xfwm4 dm: LightDM 1.26.0 
           Distro: AVL-MXE base: Debian GNU/Linux 10 (buster) 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: Dell product: Inspiron 13-5378 v: N/A serial: <filter> Chassis: 
           type: 9 serial: <filter> 
           Mobo: Dell model: 0P380W v: A00 serial: <filter> UEFI: Dell v: 1.6.1 date: 02/13/2017 
Battery:   ID-1: BAT0 charge: 8.4 Wh condition: 33.9/42.0 Wh (81%) volts: 11.9/11.4 
           model: SMP DELL Y3F7Y6B type: Li-ion serial: <filter> status: Charging 
CPU:       Topology: Dual Core model: Intel Core i7-7500U bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Kaby Lake 
           family: 6 model-id: 8E (142) stepping: 9 microcode: EA L2 cache: 4096 KiB 
           flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx bogomips: 23199 
           Speed: 3500 MHz min/max: 400/3500 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 3127 2: 3467 3: 2467 
           4: 3460 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: VMX disabled 
           Type: l1tf mitigation: PTE Inversion; VMX: conditional cache flushes, SMT vulnerable 
           Type: mds mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT vulnerable 
           Type: meltdown mitigation: PTI 
           Type: spec_store_bypass 
           mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 
           mitigation: Full generic retpoline, IBRS_FW, STIBP: conditional, RSB filling 
           Type: srbds mitigation: Microcode 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel HD Graphics 620 vendor: Dell driver: i915 v: kernel bus ID: 00:02.0 
           chip ID: 8086:5916 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.9 driver: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa 
           resolution: 1920x1080~60Hz 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel HD Graphics 620 (KBL GT2) v: 4.6 Mesa 20.1.8 
           direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: Intel Sunrise Point-LP HD Audio vendor: Dell driver: snd_hda_intel 
           v: kernel bus ID: 00:1f.3 chip ID: 8086:9d71 
           Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.9.1-rt20avl1 
Network:   Device-1: Intel Wireless 3165 driver: iwlwifi v: kernel port: f040 bus ID: 01:00.0 
           chip ID: 8086:3165 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 238.47 GiB used: 104.14 GiB (43.7%) 
           ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Toshiba model: THNSNK256GCS8 SATA 256GB size: 238.47 GiB 
           block size: physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s serial: <filter> 
           rev: 4101 temp: 33 C scheme: GPT 
Partition: ID-1: / raw size: 236.19 GiB size: 231.49 GiB (98.01%) used: 104.14 GiB (45.0%) 
           fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda2 
           ID-2: swap-1 size: 2.00 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) fs: swap swappiness: 10 (default 60) 
           cache pressure: 100 (default) dev: /dev/sda3 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 78.0 C mobo: 56.0 C sodimm: 42.0 C 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): cpu: 5842 
Repos:     Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           1: deb http://liquorix.net/debian/ sid main
           2: deb http://www.bandshed.net/kernels/apt/ buster main
           3: deb [trusted=yes] https://cinelerra-gg.org/download/pkgs/debian10/ buster main
           4: deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/debian/ buster main
           5: deb https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/Emulators:/Wine:/Debian/Debian_10/ ./
           6: deb [arch=amd64] https://download.docker.com/linux/debian/ buster stable
           7: deb http://security.debian.org/ buster/updates main
           8: deb-src http://security.debian.org/ buster/updates main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/brave-browser-release.list 
           1: deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/brave-browser-archive-keyring.gpg arch=amd64] https://brave-browser-apt-release.s3.brave.com/ stable main
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/connectify.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ buster-updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ buster main contrib non-free
           2: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian-security/ buster/updates main contrib non-free
           3: deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian/ buster main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/jami-main.list 
           1: deb https://dl.jami.net/nightly/debian_10 jami main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/kxstudio-debian-ppas.list 
           1: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/kxstudio-debian/libs/ubuntu/ bionic main
           2: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/kxstudio-debian/music/ubuntu/ bionic main
           3: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/kxstudio-debian/plugins/ubuntu/ bionic main
           4: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/kxstudio-debian/apps/ubuntu/ bionic main
           5: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/kxstudio-debian/kxstudio/ubuntu/ bionic main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/kxstudio-external.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64,i386] https://kx.studio/repo/ stable free
           2: deb [arch=amd64,i386] https://kx.studio/repo/ gcc5 free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mixxx-ubuntu-mixxx-impish.list 
           1: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/mixxx/mixxx/ubuntu impish main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
           1: deb http://la.mxrepo.com/mx/repo/ buster main non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/nathan-renniewaldock-ubuntu-flux-impish.list 
           1: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/nathan-renniewaldock/flux/ubuntu impish main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/spotify.list 
           1: deb http://repository.spotify.com/ stable non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/teams.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/ms-teams stable main
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/various.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/zotero.list 
           1: deb https://github.com/retorquere/zotero-deb/releases/download/apt-get/ ./
Info:      Processes: 237 Uptime: 14h 02m Memory: 7.65 GiB used: 2.65 GiB (34.6%) Init: SysVinit 
           v: 2.96 runlevel: 5 default: 5 Compilers: gcc: 8.3.0 alt: 8 Shell: quick-system-in 
           running in: quick-system-in inxi: 3.0.36 

So I've gone ahead and created custom mappings via Keyboard > Application Shortcuts, since there didn't seem to be any other conflicts for F1, F2, or F3 listed here. These seem to be working, though the ones @manyroads specified with the additional "&& notify-send .." commands don't work for some reason. (When I use any sort of additional "&& notify-send" clause the keyboard shortcut doesn't do anything, not even changing the volume.) So mine are just "pamixer --increase/decrease 5" and "pamixer --toggle-mute", which work but there's no GUI notification about the changes to the volume.

[Huckleberry Finn]

...When I use any sort of additional "&& notify-send" clause the keyboard shortcut doesn't do anything, not even changing the volume.

Normal. As that shell is just capable of simple commands "do this" "do that" .. but not "first do this , then do that, if that fails run xyz ..." etc.. So, they can be .sh files for each (or maybe a separate dot file in home, maybe Mark tells the exact way)


Also you can try @Eadwine Rose 's and @Jerry3904 's ways , (they may notify, too):

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=53708

viewtopic.php?p=473405#p473405

viewtopic.php?t=47645

[manyroads]

If you just want the keys to work install pamixer (first). Next in xfce4 keyboard (keybindings area) make XF86AudioLowerVolume perform the single task: pamixer --decrease 5

If you want that key to also open a notify popup (I use dunst) you will need to do as @Huckleberry stated... create a script the performs all the functions you want rather than the single pamixer command above..

Luckily there are no shortage of ways to do this... google for "linux sound keybindings" (or similar) you'll find thousands of approaches.