Dual keyboard support in Mac OS X

Question

I have a Macbook Pro and Apple external wireless keyboard. I'm using an external display and a poor-man's laptop stand (a stack of paper sheets) to align my notebook vertically so it serves as a second monitor to me. The laptop's keyboard is easy reachable by my left hand, so I was thinking maybe there is a possibility to use keys on the laptop keyboard independently from the main (wireless) one. Specifically what I'm interested in is using laptop's F1-F12 keys as shortcut keys to expose et al, while having these keys on the wirless keyboard as normal F1-F12 keys.

Is there any software to accomplish this ?

Answer 1

There's no need for additional software... for multiple keyboards and/or mice...

You can have up to 128 keyboards, mice, or other USB devices all working at the same time, as long as you have the USB ports, and/or USB Hubs as needed....

One great demo that I do to explain this is have two USB mice hooked up to a Macintosh, and play "mouse wars" with it... (Where's the mouse going? Oh you were so close!)

But seriously, the only issue that you might run into is that I am not sure you can have the F-keys defined seperately under the current OS.... Hmm... That'll require a little research...

If the standard behavior is not to your liking, try:

Controllermate

I haven't used it, but I've heard of it from MacOSXHints.com....

Answer 2

For inspiration, look at Consistent Keyboards. It is a program that swaps some keys on the external keyboard, but not the internal keyboard. (Useful for those who connect a PC-style keyboard, especially in the pre-Leopard days.)

You'll have to edit the source code, but you should be to map the function keys on only the internal keyboard to something else.