Best way to create custom keybindings

[akhi3030]

I am trying to figure out what is the best way to setup custom keybindings. I tried to look for documentation in various places but did not find anything addressing the errors I am getting so I am trying out here.

Context

cat /etc/regolith/version 
REGOLITH_VERSION=3.1

/etc/regolith/i3/config contains the following:

# Include common partials
include /usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/*

# Include any regolith i3 partials
include /usr/share/regolith/i3/config.d/*

# Include any partials common between i3 and sway sessions
include $HOME/.config/regolith3/common-wm/config.d/*

# Include any user i3 partials
include $HOME/.config/regolith3/i3/config.d/*

Based on this I created $HOME/.config/regolith3/i3/config.d/config with the following content

bindsym $mod+Tab focus right

Upon reloading the configuration, I get the following errors:

ERROR: Duplicate keybinding in config file:
  state mask 0x40 with keysym Tab, command "focus right"
ERROR: FYI: You are using i3 version 5b24e18
ERROR: Duplicate keybinding in config file:
  state mask 0x40 with keysym Tab, command "focus right"
ERROR: FYI: You are using i3 version 5b24e18
...

Based on this, I saw a duplicate setting in /usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation

...
## Navigate // Next Workspace // <> Tab ##
set_from_resource $wm.binding.ws_next wm.binding.ws_next Tab
bindsym $mod+$wm.binding.ws_next workspace next
...

Commenting out the above lines makes the errors go away.

Questions

So my question are:

• Is this the right way to setup custom keybindings?
• Do I need to find and comment out the original bindings that overlap with the custom ones? If I do this, will this cause trouble down the line if I am upgrading regolith (my understanding is that apt does not remove modified files and that can cause conflicts).

Any general guidance on how to do it cleanly will be much appreciated!
Thank you very much!

[ajkerrigan]

The how to customize a default partial docs suggest...

• Making sure you have a relevant directory for config overrides: mkdir -p ~/.config/regolith3/common-wm/config.d
• Copying /usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation to ~/.config/regolith3/common-wm/config.d/30_navigation
• Customizing your keybindings - comment/remove the default Tab binding and add yours
• Remove the package that provides the default partial - in this case sudo apt remove regolith-wm-navigation

I've done a bit of this myself since a recent upgrade to 3.1, and have found this pattern to work pretty well. I got into a habit of first searching /usr/share/regolith for a given keybinding to find where the default was defined, and then using dpkg -S to find out which apt package created that file:

❯ grep -r Tab /usr/share/regolith

/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:## Navigate // Next Workspace // <> Tab ##
/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:set_from_resource $wm.binding.ws_next wm.binding.ws_next Tab
/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:## Navigate // Next Workspace on Output // <><Ctrl> Tab ##
/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:set_from_resource $wm.binding.ws_next_on_output wm.binding.ws_next_on_output Ctrl+Tab
/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:## Navigate // Previous Workspace // <><Shift> Tab ##
/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:set_from_resource $wm.binding.ws_prev wm.binding.ws_prev Shift+Tab
/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:## Navigate // Previous Workspace on Output // <><Ctrl><Shift> Tab ##
/usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation:set_from_resource $wm.binding.ws_prev_on_output wm.binding.ws_prev_on_output Ctrl+Shift+Tab

❯ dpkg -S 30_navigation

regolith-wm-navigation: /usr/share/regolith/common/config.d/30_navigation

[akhi3030]

thank you very much for your detailed answer. Yes, this flow works for me as well.