How to Make Num Lock Keyboard ON When Login MX Linux

How to enable the num lock keyboard to be ON at MX Linux login using the XFCE desktop. There are many questions in the MX Linux community, how do you get the numeric keyboard to work as soon as the computer is turned on, so this article will discuss it.

The keyboard is an input device used to type characters, both letters and numbers. It allows people to enter text into computers or other electronic devices. It is also a tool used to navigate and control the device. The keyboard has various keys that perform different functions.

Keys are divided into alphabetic keys, numeric keys, and special keys. Alphabet keys are used to type the alphabet and numbers. Special keys are used to perform certain functions such as changing the device volume, switching between screens, and opening websites.

Numeric Keyboard Is…

The numeric keypad or keyboard is the keyboard keypad section that contains the numbers 0 to 9 and decimal points arranged like a complete addition machine with the basic operations of multiplication, division, addition, and subtraction. The numeric keypad makes it easy to enter large amounts of numeric data. Often, the keys on a numeric keyboard also function as cursor control keys.

Therefore, its meaning depends on what mode the numeric keypad is in. In numeric mode, they represent numbers; in cursor control mode, they are like arrow keys. This dual-function keyboard contains additional keys that allow you to switch modes. The name of this key varies — on many keyboards it is labeled Num Lock.

Num Lock Off

If you experience that num lock is not active when it just boots up and is still on the login screen and want the numeric keypad to be active once the computer is turned on again then this is the solution. By default the linux settings do not save the state of the numeric keys so that when you activate this numeric key at the time of restart, the linux computer will return to the initial default state, which is a condition where the numeric keyboard is not active.

Solution

To overcome this, we need to set the keyboard to condition itself as it was last used whether the num lock is on or not. Because the Linux operating system uses a variety of different Desktop Environments (DEs), the solution also differs depending on the DE.

XFCE Keyboard Settings

By default the DE display on MX Linux 21 uses XFCE, so to overcome num lock not ON at login is to open the keyboard settings, that is, please click Start Menu >> Settings >> Keyboard then the “Keyboard” window will appear as follows:

The next thing you need to do is simply check the option “Restore num lock state on start up” as shown by the red arrow above and you’re done. This configuration is an accessibility setting that allows the user to control the mouse cursor from the numeric keypad. For some unknown reason, this num lock keyboard option turns on by itself. As for the other DEs, the method is the same, please look for the keyboard settings according to the DE you are using.

Install numlockx

Numlockx is a CLI based application that can turn on the numeric keyboard at login. How to install it, please open Terminal and type the following command:

sudo apt install numlockx

When the installation process is complete, next we add the following code to run numlockx when the computer boots. Here’s the editor using MX Linux’s default text editor, Featherpad:

sudo featherpad /usr/share/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d/10_numlock.conf

The Featherpad window will appear, copy and paste the following code and save and close Featherpad:

[SeatDefaults]
greeter-setup-script=/usr/bin/numlockx on

Save the file by hitting Ctrl+S on your keyboard.

MX Linux is an open source Linux distribution. This distribution is based on the Debian Linux distribution, but uses the XFCE desktop environment. MX Linux offers a number of applications from the desktop environment, such as the Firefox web browser, the Thunderbird email client, and the default office suite, LibreOffice. Distribution also includes a number of software applications, such as Steam, which is a digital distribution platform for games and software.

MX Linux distro is designed for ordinary people without deep knowledge of technology (tech-savvy). It’s a great distro for beginners because it’s easy to use, and it’s also great for experts. There are lots of pre-installed apps on the device and they are also very lightweight. This is a great distro for people who want a distro that is easy to use and provides a lot of security and protection.

Conclusion

The num lock key not ON at login after booting linux is a classic and trivial problem because the default setting is not yet ON. For those who don’t know this, maybe this is a non-trivial problem because they don’t know what to do. Well after reading the article about how to enable the numeric keyboard num lock on linux so that it can be used to write at the login screen, we hope you don’t have any more problems with this. Hopefully useful and keep sharing!.