How can I find what is interfering with CTRL+F?

Question

I'm running LinuxMint12 with Gnome with Cario-Dock and I have a logitech G15 keyboard. I set up a bash script with the extra keys to take the active window, resize it, and move it to a specific location on one of my screens. But after a few days of usage when I restarted my computer the CTRL+F shortcut stopped working in applications like FireFox, chrome, or any other program I try. A lot of things changed between restarts so I'm not even sure where to start looking.

At first it was launching the folder stack from Cairo-Dock so I disabled that shortcut. Now it does nothing. I've gone through the configuration editor->apps->metacity->global_keybinding and nothing is conflicting. I also went through system settings->Keyboard->Shortcuts and found no conflicts there. I don't know of any other places to look.

Other shortcuts do run, like CTRL+F6 in netbeans to run unit tests.

Is there a way to find what might be interfering with my CTRL+F shortcut? Where else should I look to find possible conflicts? Thanks.

--update-- Rev 2: since the original xev doesn't help, I removed it. When I do keep xev focused it does register CTRL+F

...
    KeyPress event, serial 32, synthetic NO, window 0x4400001,
        root 0x19f, subw 0x0, time 136672187, (1120,275), root:(1122,1415),
        state 0x10, keycode 37 (keysym 0xffe3, Control_L), same_screen YES,
        XLookupString gives 0 bytes: 
        XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes: 
        XFilterEvent returns: False

    FocusOut event, serial 32, synthetic NO, window 0x4400001,
        mode NotifyGrab, detail NotifyAncestor

    FocusIn event, serial 32, synthetic NO, window 0x4400001,
        mode NotifyUngrab, detail NotifyAncestor

    KeymapNotify event, serial 32, synthetic NO, window 0x0,
        keys:  2   0   0   0   32  0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   
               0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   

    KeyRelease event, serial 32, synthetic NO, window 0x4400001,
        root 0x19f, subw 0x0, time 136672827, (1120,275), root:(1122,1415),
        state 0x14, keycode 37 (keysym 0xffe3, Control_L), same_screen YES,
        XLookupString gives 0 bytes: 
        XFilterEvent returns: False

    ClientMessage event, serial 32, synthetic YES, window 0x4400001,
        message_type 0x10a (WM_PROTOCOLS), format 32, message 0x108 (WM_DELETE_WINDOW)

Solution 1

I had the same problem on Linux Mint 13 and the same output on xev, namely Control_l + f was mapped to Control_l.

My solution: I remembered that I have xbindkeys running to enable some exotic buttons on my tablet pc.

By running xbindkeys-config and checking all key mappings defined for xbindkeys I found an entry that interfered with CTRL-F.

After deleting the offending mapping and saving the new settings, CTRL-F works again and correctly launches the search dialog in gedit, firefox, ...

Solution 2

I know it's not a perfect solution, but you can try to eliminate processes one by one to figure out which one do the mess, but first:

Create another user, and test it there to verify if it's a user-settings specific.

Change window manager to simplest possible (twm?) to see if it's a window manager specific.

Good luck.

Solution 3

I had the same problem with Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Y, including a corresponding xev output with "KeymapNotify event".

The solution was: Assign a new keyboard shortcut to exactly that combinations with xfce4-keyboard-settings and delete them afterwards. After that Ctrl+Z (undo) and Ctrl+Y (redo) worked again.

Comments

[Admin]

Where did you set up the shortcut? Run xev in a terminal and press Ctrl+F: what happens?

[Admin]

Alright, I removed the old xev output and kept the window focused where it did register the keys

[Admin]

Man, your xev isn't registering Ctrl-F. It's registering left control, but the F is missing.