Small keyboards (+- 68 keys) will join the F rows as well as the Escape key to the numbers row, since this bothers me so much, I wanted to remap the backtick to Escape key BUT only on this keyboard (other keyboard will have their normal mapping).
After scouring on the internet for hours I made this gist you don't have to go through what I did.
Install evtest
sudo pacman -S evtest # Arch based
sudo apt install evtest # Debian based
Locate your keyboard in /dev/input/by-id/
ls /dev/input/by-id
Find something like usb-Keychron_Keychron_K6-* (depends on your keyboard)
Run evtest
evtest /dev/input/by-id/usb-Keychron_Keychron_K6-event-kbd
Press your key (Escape, and then backtick)
Testing ... (interrupt to exit)
Event: time 1628290151.645272, type 4 (EV_MSC), code 4 (MSC_SCAN), value __70035__
Event: time 1628290151.645272, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 1 (KEY_ESC), value 1
Event: time 1628290151.645272, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------
^[Event: time 1628290151.778901, type 4 (EV_MSC), code 4 (MSC_SCAN), value 70035
Event: time 1628290151.778901, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 1 (KEY_ESC), value 0
Event: time 1628290151.778901, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------
Event: time 1628290154.048148, type 4 (EV_MSC), code 4 (MSC_SCAN), value __70029__
Event: time 1628290154.048148, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 41 (KEY_GRAVE), value 1
Event: time 1628290154.048148, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------
`Event: time 1628290154.139326, type 4 (EV_MSC), code 4 (MSC_SCAN), value 70029
Event: time 1628290154.139326, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 41 (KEY_GRAVE), value 0
Event: time 1628290154.139326, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------
Now we know the keyscan of Escape is 70035 and backtick is 70029
Note down the bus, vendor, and product hex value from the TOP of the evtest output and convert them to 4 digit with uppercase:
❯ evtest /dev/input/by-id/usb-Keychron_Keychron_K6-event-kbd
Input driver version is 1.0.1
Input device ID: bus _0x3_ vendor _0x5ac_ product _0x24f_ version 0x111
Input device name: "Keychron Keychron K6"
Supported events:
bus - 0x3 - 0003 vendor - 0x5ac - 05AC product - 0x24f - 024F
Create a file in /etc/udev/hwdb.d/10-keyboard-switch and change the numbers accordingly:
# b = bus, v = vendor, p = product
evdev:input:b0003v05ACp024F*
KEYBOARD_KEY_70029=grave # map Escape to grave(backtick)
KEYBOARD_KEY_70035=esc # map grave(backtick) to Escape
And then update the hwdb and udev
sudo systemd-hwdb update && sudo udevadm trigger
Done, Tested on Arch Linux.
References: