ESC needed in active window to enter, copy or paste

[aguador]

I've searched the forum a bit but have seen no mention of a problem that has been annoying me know for a while. I frequently find that I cannot enter text, copy or paste in an active window until I hit ESC or, sometimes, click a couple of times on the window. What is puzzling is that I can, for example, highlight text but not copy it or paste over it -- and the cursor is plainly visible. In other words, since highlighting and the cursor seem normal, I cannot predict when a copy or paste or keyboard entry attempt will fail. I have noticed this most in Firefox and Evolution (e-mail client), but also in LibreOffice. I am not sure if I have inadvertently changed a setting or if this is a bug of some sort.

I am running Mageia 4 on three different machines, two of which I use virtually daily: an Asus A53S laptop (running 64-bit install) and Asus EeePC netbook (32 bit). Both have this problem.

[rolf]

I've had what seems very much like this issue for quite a while on Rosa, OpenMandriva, and, now Mageia 5.

Please let this thread survive. I've spent a lot of time searching and only found this post from a while back that seems relevant to what I am experiencing.

For example, I open a new instance of konsole and keystrokes don't echo to the konsole screen unless I press ESC. I open gnome-mplayer, as just now, put the mouse pointer over the "File" menu, it becomes highlighted but, when I click, nothing happens. I press ESC and the File menu opens immediately when I click it.

This is random and unpredictable, afaict, but it happens every time I use the computer, every day, just not every time I use any given app.

I've tried different USB-connected mouse/keyboard combinations and presently use the wireless Logitech K360 and M315 devices.

I used to hold down the space bar until the auto-repeat feature kicked in, after a second or so, which I could see happen in, e.g. konsole, then the app became responsive to mouse/keyboard input and stayed that way as long as that instance of the app was open. Later in session, another instance of this app or of an app where I experience this level of non-response to input might or might not have this issue; text fields, dialogs, seamonkey browser, it happens to many, if not all of my gui apps..

Thanks to aquador, I know to only hit ESC once and continue with my business. As I've said, this has been an issue across multiple distros, although I don't have a clear mental record of exactly which ones, getting old, and for a significant time, probably on the order of a year or so. I keep my distro updated with the excellent software management tools descended from Mandrake, which I started using in July 2000, Mandrake Deluxe 7.1

Maybe the cause is evident to someone else but the most likely source, given the rarity of such reports, seems to me to be hardware/driver related (possibly desktop effects, this reminds me, which I might test later but I wanted to write something down while I'm thinking about it). I've tried random "Focus" settings in the "Window Behavior" module of SystemSettings and reverted to Default with no apparent effect. Here's a little inxi output for hardware information, thanks:

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[rolf@p8z68 ~]$ inxi -C -A -G -S -d -MI         
System:    Host: p8z68 Kernel: 4.1.13-desktop-2.mga5 x86_64 (64 bit) Desktop: KDE Plasma 4.14.5
           Distro: Mageia 5 thornicroft
Machine:   Mobo: ASUSTeK model: P8Z68 DELUXE/GEN3 v: Rev 1.xx
           Bios: American Megatrends v: 3304 date: 04/17/2012
CPU:       Quad core Intel Core i7-2600K (-HT-MCP-) cache: 8192 KB
           clock speeds: max: 5900 MHz 1: 3527 MHz 2: 3967 MHz 3: 4299 MHz 4: 3834 MHz
           5: 3707 MHz 6: 3621 MHz 7: 3796 MHz 8: 4151 MHz
Graphics:  Card-1: Intel 2nd Generation Core Processor Family Integrated Graphics Controller
           Card-2: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Pitcairn PRO [Radeon HD 7850 / R7 265 / R9 270 1024SP]
           Display Server: X.Org 1.16.4 drivers: fglrx,v4l Resolution: 1280x800, 1920x1080
           GLX Renderer: AMD Radeon HD 7800 Series GLX Version: 4.5.13397 - CPC 15.20.1046
Audio:     Card-1 C-Media CMI8788 [Oxygen HD Audio] driver: snd_virtuoso
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture v: k4.1.13-desktop-2.mga5
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 9183.7GB (52.7% used)
           ID-1: /dev/sda model: Hitachi_HDS72202 size: 2000.4GB
           ID-2: /dev/sdb model: TOSHIBA_DT01ACA3 size: 3000.6GB
           ID-3: /dev/sdc model: ST32000644NS size: 2000.4GB
           ID-4: /dev/sdd model: ST32000644NS size: 2000.4GB
           ID-5: /dev/sdf model: INTEL_SSDSC2CW12 size: 120.0GB
           ID-6: /dev/sde model: OCZ size: 61.9GB
           Optical-1: /dev/sr0 model: HL-DT-ST BD-RE  WH12LS39 dev-links: cdrom,cdrw,dvd,dvdrw
           Features: speed: 40x multisession: yes
           audio: yes dvd: yes rw: cd-r,cd-rw,dvd-r,dvd-ram
           Optical-2: /dev/sr1 model: HL-DT-ST DVD-RAM GH22NS30 dev-links: N/A
           Features: speed: 48x multisession: yes
           audio: yes dvd: yes rw: cd-r,cd-rw,dvd-r,dvd-ram
Info:      Processes: 257 Uptime: 15:09 Memory: 2659.9/15946.3MB
           Client: Shell (bash) inxi: 2.2.32
[rolf@p8z68 ~]$

[rolf]

I'm conditionally marking my part of this thread solved. I did disable Desktop Effects, then switched from OpenGL compositing to Xrender, losing my Desktop Grid effect. For a short while (day or so), this problem didn't occur. I didn't test for long as I wanted to go back from my Radeon card, HD 7850, to a new GTX 960. I have a theory that compositing and fglrx don't get along and I wanted to try nvidia again.

So far, so good. I can use OpenGL compositing desktop effects including Desktop Grid and have not encountered the problem of unresponsive keyboard strokes or menu clicks.

I didn't hook up the wide screen tv to a second head on the card, yet, so conditions are different, but I hope that won't be a factor in this.