Loss of Keyboard Input

[PeteGingaNinja]

I'm running RC 1 on Leopard 9A466 with Windows XP SP2 VL.

What I've noticed is now and again, I completely lose Keyboard Input. It's bizarre because the Start Key (Apple) works, but no other keys do, the mouse works fine. Now no matter what I do, I cannot grab the input again even if I reboot Win XP, close down Fusion and re-open, delete the Preferences, the only way to resolve it is to reboot Mac!

Now I don't know if this is a VMWare problem or a Leopard problem, so I will submit it to Apple as well, but would be nice to know if any one else is having this problem, perhaps on Tiger!

[admin]

Check if this thread helps: Fusion 4.1b/Leopard problem with keyboard[/url]

[ColoradoMarmot]

Not a lepoard issue - happens to me and I'm still on tiger. MBP, RC1, mouse works, no keyboard after resume.

[vinayv]

What kind of keyboard do you have? If it is a blue tooth keyboard, make sure that the VM isn't grabbing the Bluetooth adapter (this will disconnect the bluetooth keyboard from the mac).

[ColoradoMarmot]

It's the built-in keyboard on the macbook pro.

I tracked it down to the VPN software my company uses. Turn it off, and the keyboard comes back.

[PeteGingaNinja]

What kind of keyboard do you have? If it is a blue

tooth keyboard, make sure that the VM isn't grabbing

the Bluetooth adapter (this will disconnect the

bluetooth keyboard from the mac).

It's the built in keyboard within the MacBook.

[PeteGingaNinja]

It's the built-in keyboard on the macbook pro.

I tracked it down to the VPN software my company

uses. Turn it off, and the keyboard comes back.

Not using any VPN software! And have tried shutting down all other programs, but unless I reboot Mac, I cannot get the input back.

[Joe_F]

I have the same problem with my new MacBook Pro. I use XP in a virtual disk and Vista from Bootcamp and it happens to both, several times a day. I will hold off Fusion ordering until this gets fixed

[bgertzfield]

Here's my comments from the thread that etung linked. Can the folks who are reporting keyboard trouble please run these commands, then report the results here on the thread?

We'll have to individually contact each of the vendors who are disabling keyboard input to Fusion.

===

Sounds like some application has turned on Secure Event Input, which unfortunately disables keyboard input to VMware Fusion when not in Unity mode. Can you try running the following from Terminal:

ioreg -l -w 0 | grep SecureInput

You'll see a line like:

\| "IOConsoleUsers" = ({"kCGSSessionSecureInputPID"=4695, (...)

If you can then run:

ps auxww | grep 4695

where 4695 is the number you see after "kCGSSessionSecureInputPID", it'll tell you what program has enabled Secure Event Input.

If you could let us know which process has done this (and not disabled Secure Event Input when it was done), we can contact the software provider to let them know they're breaking Fusion.

Thanks for your patience!

===

[patwoods]

I have a variation of this as well. I have a MBP and several times a day I lose keyboard. The funny thing is also that my left-mouse-click now becomes reassigned and I cannot left-click. I try to double click a folder for example to open it, and it pops up the 'properties' instead. Quitting fusion and restarting (pain in the butt) seems to fix. This affects both a BootCamp Vista VM as well as a standard XP VM so it's not something on the windows side causing this.

[patwoods]

Forgot to add, running the ioreg terminal command gets me nothing in return so I assume it is not the secureinput referenced above here.

[nshirey]

I am running OSX 10.4 (Tiger) on a macbook pro and have not lost keyboard input.

[ColoradoMarmot]

Confirmed - it's my VPN software.

[maxim_porges]

I'm having the same issue (loss of keyboard input, but mouse and start button \[via Apple key] working fine). I'm using CheckPoint's VPN SecureClient.

Is this going to be addressed before Fusion is released? Being able to use my VPN software on my Mac and my Windows installation at the same time is a crucial feature (for me at least).

[maxim_porges]

As requested, here is the Terminal output from the commands listed in the forum post.

porgesm 460 0.4 -0.0 27372 428 p1 S+ 1:54PM 0:00.00 grep 418

porgesm 418 0.0 -1.0 415536 20856 ?? S 1:53PM 0:03.16 /opt/CPsrsc-50/bin/SecureClient.app/Contents/MacOS/SecureClient -psn_0_3014657

This is definitely SecureClient.

[maxim_porges]

Sorry, should have read the post linked to above. Apparently there is a workaround to use Unity, which I am going to try.

Here's the link again for other people like me who might not read everything before they post...

http://www.vmware.com/community/thread.jspa?threadID=90810

[placain]

vista:~ dmd$ ioreg -l -w 0 | grep SecureInput

| "IOConsoleUsers" = ({"kCGSSessionGroupIDKey"=501,"kCGSSessionOnConsoleKey"=Yes,"kCGSSessionIDKey"=256,"kCGSSessionUserNameKey"="dmd","kCGSessionLoginDoneKey"=Yes,"kCGSessionLongUserNameKey"="Daniel Drucker","kCGSSessionSystemSafeBoot"=No,"kCGSSessionLoginwindowSafeLogin"=No,"kCGSSessionConsoleSetKey"=0,"kCGSSessionUserIDKey"=501,"kCGSSessionSecureInputPID"=230})

vista:~ dmd$ ps auxww|grep 230

dmd 230 0.0 -0.4 242616 9144 ?? S 1:05PM 0:00.58 /Applications/Sofa Control.app/Contents/MacOS/Sofa Control -psn_0_1572865

That's this: http://caseapps.com/sofacontrol.html

[bgertzfield]

Thanks. I've contacted the Sofa Control developers to let them know how they can fix the problem.

For what it's worth, folks, if you run into software that causes this issue, you can email the developers this link that explains how to correct it. VMware Fusion is not the only software impacted by this issue, so it'll help everyone out.

http://developer.apple.com/technotes/tn2007/tn2150.html

[csuhdba]

vm fusion 1.0 rhel 5.1 on dvd - anaconda installer works fine up to the point where you need input - then nothing.. using oel/rhel 5.0 on cd - no problem.. on macbook..

not resonable to expect all other developers to do something for another isv.. vmfusion needs fix to work in current environment as is..

[bgertzfield]

vm fusion 1.0 rhel 5.1 on dvd - anaconda installer works fine up to the point where you need input - then nothing.. using oel/rhel 5.0 on cd - no problem.. on macbook..

Hi csuhdba,

Here's the steps to diagnose this problem, from earlier in the thread. Can you please try them and let us know what the result is?

===

Sounds like some application has turned on Secure Event Input, which unfortunately disables keyboard input to VMware Fusion when not in Unity mode. Can you try running the following from Terminal:

ioreg -l -w 0 | grep SecureInput

You'll see a line like:

| "IOConsoleUsers" = ({"kCGSSessionSecureInputPID"=4695, (...)

If you can then run:

ps auxww | grep 4695

where 4695 is the number you see after "kCGSSessionSecureInputPID", it'll tell you what program has enabled Secure Event Input.

If you could let us know which process has done this (and not disabled Secure Event Input when it was done), we can contact the software provider to let them know they're breaking Fusion.

Thanks for your patience!

===