Saturday, November 25, 2006

KeyFix4000: Improve your MS Natural Keyboard 4000

I'm loving the MS Natural Keyboard 4000, but it does have some issues.

First, it is conspicuously missing a Windows key on the right side. Second, there is no way to remap the back and forward buttons to act as mouse buttons. After googling in futility for a solution, I decided to whip one up myself. (After all, this was nothing a little keyboard hooking couldn't solve.)

The result? KeyFix4000.

The mouse button mapping is pretty straight-forward - it just translates a click on the back/forward button to a click on the left/right mouse button.

The Windows key issue was a little tricky - how do you fix a key that doesn't exist? Well, the Apps key is pretty much where the Windows key should be, and I realized I could overload it. Now, when pressed by itself, it functions as the Apps key, and when pressed in combination with another key, it works as the Windows key. This dual usage works surprisingly well.

Download executable
C++ source code at GitHub

4 comments:

  1. Hi!
    Nice info, big thx.

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  2. I was so getting my hopes up with this (since a specific application I'm using wants the right Windows key), but I'm not having much luck...

    It loads without error, but the options menu entry doesn't bring up anything, and the right Apps button still does the same as always (even if I press it along with all kinds of other buttons).

    I'm running XP SP2.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Talked to Frescard via email - there's a specific app (VBS2) that this doesn't work with (it uses nonstandard keyboard handling). If anyone has any solutions for that app, please share...

    ReplyDelete