And I’m Fn’ serious. My Surface had this, and I couldn’t believe how often I referenced it, since I’d switch modes a lot. I don’t expect a wizard to appear to retroactively supply one on my palmrest (or embedded into the Fn key), but I’ll settle for a sorcerer.
…Or, failing that, a little tray app that changes graphics depending on mode (a lil’ gear or something; nothing gross like a green blob that has a Fn/F1 animation that causes dizziness and vertigo when I press the button; just a small, subtle text toggle).
I know. I toggle it a lot though. I’d like to know what button I’m pressing when I press them without experimenting and accidently getting help for using Microsoft Edge.
For some Fn reason (Fedora 35), the state of the Fn lock keeps changing (and I swear I’m not pressing Fn+Esc), so it’s a coin toss every time I press an F key what it’s going to do.
This gives me hope; unless something wonky is happening elsewhere, this suggests that it might be configurable from the OS, which means the state is leaking into someplace that can be addressed, access, possibly queried, and possible written to.
Do you use any other OS with it? Does it happen there as well, or is it only Fedora?
Glad this has been driving at least a few others crazy, too. I usually just press F11/PRT SCR to test, but some sort of visual indicator would be cool. Does it have to be a hardware light? How hard would it be to put a little software indicator on the top bar to the left of the wifi, battery, etc… indicators?
I’ve been thinking about that as well. A Framework icon in the notification area in Windows (perhaps a torx that changes colours or inverts or whatever) would work nicely, and I’d happily settle for that.
I picked up my device yesterday (gee whizz the packing and shipping was quick!). I am impressed by the quality of the hardware etc. However, the lack of a light showing if the fn lock is on or off is annoying.
Dear Framework team, please make standard, for future keyboards, a little light on the esc/fn lock key to indicate state. Just like on the caps lock key.
For now, The Internet says that for some laptops (i.e. the LG Gram, see https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/admin-guide/laptops/lg-laptop.html) the toggle state is available, for Linux devices, in /sys/. This can then be read to display somehow (apparently also possible on Windows). But I can’t find something equivalent for the Framework. Perhaps an update to the BIOS to expose the state to the OS?
Perhaps use one of the side LEDs or the power button? IE Power button breathing is fn’ locked and solid is non fn’ locked. Many colors to choose from on the side LEDs.
How many LEDs are there for the kb backlight? If it’s localized enough may be able to do an indicator on some part of the kb to indicate what state it’s in.
Could even have a fn’ press blink the kb light once for locked and twice for unlocked or something, if the individual LEDs aren’t addressable.
I think what we really need is a way to read the EC from the OS.
fn’ great OP BTW.