How do I get current keyboard layout?

Question

I'm wondering is there any command line tool, that returns current keyboard layout.

I have XkbLayout set to us, ru.

Update: setxkbmap returns layout settings, not selected layout. E.g.:

$ setxkbmap -print | grep xkb_symbols
xkb_symbols   { include "pc+us+ru:2+inet(evdev)+capslock(grouplock)+terminate(ctrl_alt_bksp)"   };

It will return same result no matter what current layout is.

Answer 1

Maybe this is version dependent, but on my machine that uses setxkbmap 1.3.0 the following command works:

setxkbmap -query | grep layout

Note that depending on your need it may be useless to know only the layout : for instance the Dvorak variant of the US layout is quite different than the default QWERTY. The -query option of setxkbmap gives both the layout and the variant, as different fields :

$ setxkbmap -query
rules:      evdev
model:      default
layout:     fr
variant:    bepo
options:    grp:alt_shift_toggle

Answer 2

There is xkb-switch which is described thus:

xkb-switch is a C++ program that allows to query and change the XKB layout state.

https://github.com/ierton/xkb-switch

Or, following nozimica's suggestion, you could use:

setxkbmap -print | awk -F"+" '/xkb_symbols/ {print $2}'

From this thread on the Arch Linux boards: https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=539406

Answer 3

Yes THERE IS a command line tool that does what you want! I just discovered it 10min ago :)

Look at here: https://github.com/nonpop/xkblayout-state

xkblayout-state print "%s"

does exactly what you want (it doesn't output an end of line, so add ; echo if you need). run the tool without parameters for the help.

Answer 4

Use this to get the code for the current layout:

$(xset -q|grep LED| awk '{ print $10 }')

This might needs to be converted to a form you want, like:

case "$(xset -q|grep LED| awk '{ print $10 }')" in
  "00000002") KBD="English" ;;
  "00001002") KBD="Thai" ;;
  *) KBD="unknown" ;;
esac

Answer 5

Another simpler approach, because of fixed positions of the output of the xset -q command, is this:

xset -q | grep -A 0 'LED' | cut -c59-67

It prints 00000002 or 00001002 depending on your current keyboard layout.

Answer 6

From Goosfrabaa in the Arch Linux forums:

setxkbmap -v | awk -F "+" '/symbols/ {print $2}'

This works correctly here, and prints us(dvorak-intl) (displayed as "USA Dvorak international" in the GNOME keyboard selection menu).

Answer 7

You can use:

setxkbmap -print | grep xkb_symbols

Answer 8

On newer systems, you can use

localectl status

It will for instance show you the following:

System Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8
       VC Keymap: us
      X11 Layout: us