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On most full sized PC keyboards there is a context menu key. See photo below.

enter image description here

My new laptop doesn't have one of these keys, but I use it all the time. The context menu shows the context menu of the currently selected item, not the item currently underneath the mouse pointer.

My question is, how can I re-map another key combination (preferably CTRL + PrtSc) to perform the same operation?

Greg
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  • Related: http://askubuntu.com/questions/389353/how-can-i-set-a-certain-keycode-to-a-key-and-bind-it-to-the-right-action?rq=1 and http://askubuntu.com/questions/254424/how-can-i-change-what-keys-on-my-keyboard-do-how-can-i-create-custom-keyboard – Elder Geek Oct 26 '16 at 18:00
  • What exactly should the key do? I don't have it :) It seems simply the same as the right- mouseclick, right? – Jacob Vlijm Oct 26 '16 at 18:20
  • @JacobVlijm Yes, it opens right-click menu :) – Michal Polovka Oct 26 '16 at 18:30
  • Ah, in that case, see my answer :) – Jacob Vlijm Oct 26 '16 at 18:35
  • Hi Greg, did you notice the answer? – Jacob Vlijm Oct 27 '16 at 14:58
  • The context menu shows the context menu of the currently selected item, not the item currently underneath the mouse pointer. – Greg Oct 27 '16 at 17:57
  • Due to using a keyboard to navigate, rather than a mouse, the mousepointer will most definitely not be hovering over the icon that is currently selected - useful to include that in the question... – Jacob Vlijm Oct 27 '16 at 18:00

1 Answers1

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On my system, I do have a context menu key.

In a terminal, when I run xev, which should be present by default on your system as well, I see this output (in part):

KeyPress event, serial 48, synthetic NO, window 0x2000001,  
    root 0x96, subw 0x0, time 12548175, (334,-138), root:(588,185),  
    state 0x0, keycode 135 (keysym 0xff67, Menu), same_screen YES,  
    XLookupString gives 0 bytes:   
    XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes:   
    XFilterEvent returns: False

KeyRelease event, serial 48, synthetic NO, window 0x2000001,  
    root 0x96, subw 0x0, time 12548242, (334,-138), root:(588,185),  
    state 0x0, keycode 135 (keysym 0xff67, Menu), same_screen YES,  
    XLookupString gives 0 bytes:   
    XFilterEvent returns: False

If you want to know more about xev, this maybe informative: Weekend Project: Configure Your Keyboard Into Submission

I suggest you try to bind a convenient spare keyboard shortcut to "Menu" using whichever method your distro provides and see if that works for cases where you know or expect that the right-click effect isn't the same as pressing on the Menu key.

DK Bose
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