NumLock SOLVED ??

[grumtac]

Greetings,
I complained a few days ago about Sendkeys and Numlock issues. I
questioned various keyboard makers and all replied that I would not
find a numpad that will ALWAYS send numbers no matter what, except for
programable ones.

So, I thought I would try my next option, "Keyboard Remapping", and
golly Gee.... It works GREAT !

I used a Program called KeyTweak, and simply made all the numbers and
Del key emulate the numbers in the row above the alpha keys. Works like
a champ, and we have not found it to have any bad affect with any oter
programs we run.

Obviously it will not work for people who use the numpad for scrolling
and such. I think that must be pretty much only "Gamers" ?? We do not
play games, and now, We get NUMBERS no matter what state the numlock
is, it works perfectly. I made a whole lot of people happy with this !
(Caps lock also can be wacky, but it seems only for those who want to
keep it on)

I didn't want to do this initially if a program had to be running in
the background, but I found that Win2k and XP can allow the keyboard to
be remapped and saved to the registry. KeyTweak allows you to save such
data, and set it back to original with a simple click. Unfortunately,
it does not work for Win98, but we have few of them left operating
anyhow.

So, if you are sick and tired of Sendkeys statements and numlock
issues, give KeyTweak a try... You can google it and find it easily.

Thanks
Grummy

 

[Marshall Barton]

That sure sounds like the wrong way around, especially when
you consider that NumLock is the least of the problems with
SenKeys. Are you sure you can not find a way to avoid
SendKeys altogether.

 

[John Nurick]

Neat idea ... except maybe for laptop users<g>.

Greetings,
I complained a few days ago about Sendkeys and Numlock issues. I
questioned various keyboard makers and all replied that I would not
find a numpad that will ALWAYS send numbers no matter what, except for
programable ones.

So, I thought I would try my next option, "Keyboard Remapping", and
golly Gee.... It works GREAT !

I used a Program called KeyTweak, and simply made all the numbers and
Del key emulate the numbers in the row above the alpha keys. Works like
a champ, and we have not found it to have any bad affect with any oter
programs we run.

Obviously it will not work for people who use the numpad for scrolling
and such. I think that must be pretty much only "Gamers" ?? We do not
play games, and now, We get NUMBERS no matter what state the numlock
is, it works perfectly. I made a whole lot of people happy with this !
(Caps lock also can be wacky, but it seems only for those who want to
keep it on)

I didn't want to do this initially if a program had to be running in
the background, but I found that Win2k and XP can allow the keyboard to
be remapped and saved to the registry. KeyTweak allows you to save such
data, and set it back to original with a simple click. Unfortunately,
it does not work for Win98, but we have few of them left operating
anyhow.

So, if you are sick and tired of Sendkeys statements and numlock
issues, give KeyTweak a try... You can google it and find it easily.

Thanks
Grummy

 

[grumtac]

That sure sounds like the wrong way around, especially when
you consider that NumLock is the least of the problems with
SenKeys.

I too agree with that "wrong way around" statement, after all, The
numlock state has never come up as a problem in supporting any other
program I deal with. I did quite a bit of research, and really could
not find a compelling argument to keep the numlock operational. I had
hopes that there would be a tweak to just force it on permanently, but
it seems OS/2 might be the only one that can actually do that.

In our case, there is no user that turns it off for even one half of 1%
of their daily work. It has been on 100% of the time, and everyone
agreed that they prefered it to never shut off. While we do have many
desktops with a Laptop, they also have a Desktop PC, so they never do
anything with Access on it unless they want to fiddle with watching
Numlock.

I found that more than a few "Gamers" needed to be able to turn it off
to play Games, and only one or two threads where some office personel
swapped between the Numbers and the Arrows for navigation. I think
Numlocks function has been replaced by todays mouse and other I/O
devices. Not sure there is really any good reason for it
anymore.......... Looks to me like an old puppy dog from DOS days.

Are you sure you can not find a way to avoid
SendKeys altogether.

There is, but it is the time factor involved that is a problem. Though
I have my share of time in this development, it is mostly supported by
a 3rd party developer 3 hours away. (I am NOT a programmer!) I would
conclude that it would take 6 months to a year for him to find time to
really cleanse out the SendKeys statements.... Not in pure time, but in
real time fitting it in and us continuously testing to make sure it
works. We just do not have that amount of time to spend on it, as our
real goal was to use access as a stepping stone to something better
after we identified and used Access as a model of what we wanted and
really needed. We've got almost two years running it, and it has been
pretty reliable. However, our real goal though is to find ways to break
free from MS's constant updates, and one way to do that would be thru
the creation of an HTML front end/Interface for some yet unknown format
backend. Then we could run one of the newer Linux Desktop Os's.

I have read numerous times, that Access fiddles with the state of
Numlock to "Get a BaseLine" or something like that. Currently, it STILL
fiddles with the numlock state, but now I at least ALWAYS get numbers
when my users use the numpad. So far, I do not see any reason to avoid
the remapping. My users want NUMBERS... Now they Get it !

Thanks,
Grummy

 

[grumtac]

That sure sounds like the wrong way around, especially when
you consider that NumLock is the least of the problems with
SenKeys.

Just happened to think......

"Least of the Problems"...... Is there any other issue that you know of
other than it fiddling with Numlock and Capslock ?? That is all I ever
saw here.... The SendKeys use in our Development has two problem areas
with the CapsLock, But had constant problems with Numlock. Capslock
isn't too bad, because at least you stay in the same field when you
find out the state changed. That is unlike NumLock, where users would
end up messing up all kinds of stuff accidentally, sometimes in
completely different forms.

I will probably focus on the code of the areas where Capslock goes
wacky and get that fixed, but then Numlocks can do whatever they want
now with the remap

This is a Access97 dev, so who knows, maybe an upgrade someday will be
the real fix for us. We figured we would use it no more than 5
years......

If you know of some other strange thing I should watch for because of
the SendKeys use, I would appreciate hearing it. So far the Num/Caps
issues is all I ever saw complaints about, and the commands themselves
are doing the job.

Thanks,
Grummy

 

[Marshall Barton]

Just happened to think......

"Least of the Problems"...... Is there any other issue that you know of
other than it fiddling with Numlock and Capslock ?? That is all I ever
saw here.... The SendKeys use in our Development has two problem areas
with the CapsLock, But had constant problems with Numlock. Capslock
isn't too bad, because at least you stay in the same field when you
find out the state changed. That is unlike NumLock, where users would
end up messing up all kinds of stuff accidentally, sometimes in
completely different forms.

I will probably focus on the code of the areas where Capslock goes
wacky and get that fixed, but then Numlocks can do whatever they want
now with the remap

This is a Access97 dev, so who knows, maybe an upgrade someday will be
the real fix for us. We figured we would use it no more than 5
years......

If you know of some other strange thing I should watch for because of
the SendKeys use, I would appreciate hearing it. So far the Num/Caps
issues is all I ever saw complaints about, and the commands themselves
are doing the job.

As Nikos tried to explain in your other thread, SendKeys can
send the key codes to the wrong program. The fundamental
issue is that SendKeys is an archaic holdover from the early
days of DOS (long before Access), before application had a
real programming capability. In that environment, there
could only be a single program active on the machine, thus,
there was no confusion about where to send the key codes.
In today's multi-tasking systems, there can be many programs
running at the same time and there is no guarantee the
active program is the one you want to receive the key codes.
Even if you tell the users not to start any other programs,
there are lots of ways that programs can start
automatically.

Bottom line is that SendKeys is just plain dangerous so if
can't avoid it, keep your eyes open for your systems
exhibiting strange behavior.