Here's one, anyone have an answer?

  • Thread starter Thread starter MF
  • Start date Start date
M

MF

Writing email. Pushed the shift button, then started thinking things over.
"blurp" says windows (XP SP2) and up comes the little dialog asking about
Accessibility Options. Without paying much attention, I clicked cancel, as
I have done dozens of times.

Well, something didn't cancel. I go back to the email and notice that the
caps lock and shift keys aren't working properly. (capslock turned on gives
lower case, turned off it gives upper case, and the shift keys don't work at
all. The number pad keys aren't working. I go back to the desktop and see
that the task bar has doubled in size, the icons on taskbar and systray have
doubled in size and are out of focus, as if resolution had been decreased to
a minimum, and I have lost the bottom row of icons on the desktop itself.
The desktop icons have remained the same size.

So I go thru start menu and task bar properties. Nothing has changed. I go
through language and keyboard settings. Nothing has changed. I go through
accessibility options to see what has been turned on. Nothing has been
turned on; everything is as it was before. I turn on then turn off
"magnifier" to see if that fixes things. Nope. I look thru help, incl. KB
articles to find a clue. Nothing. I was going to go thru process explorer
to see if I could identify the offending process, but the icon for it was
gone from the desktop. So now I am pissed off.

So I restart into last known good, which should have been yesterday. No
joy. The distorted taskbar comes back and the icons are still missing from
the desktop. Finally, a system restore to yesterday fixed things.

But I never did find out the cause. Anyone ever run into this and did
discover the cause? And let me repeat for emphasis: no accessibility
options were visibly turned on.

Thanks!
Mike
x-posted to alt.comp.hardware
 
MF said:
Writing email. Pushed the shift button, then started thinking things
over. "blurp" says windows (XP SP2) and up comes the little dialog asking
about Accessibility Options. Without paying much attention, I clicked
cancel, as I have done dozens of times.

Well, something didn't cancel. I go back to the email and notice that the
caps lock and shift keys aren't working properly. (capslock turned on
gives lower case, turned off it gives upper case, and the shift keys don't
work at all. The number pad keys aren't working. I go back to the
desktop and see that the task bar has doubled in size, the icons on
taskbar and systray have doubled in size and are out of focus, as if
resolution had been decreased to a minimum, and I have lost the bottom row
of icons on the desktop itself. The desktop icons have remained the same
size.

So I go thru start menu and task bar properties. Nothing has changed. I
go through language and keyboard settings. Nothing has changed. I go
through accessibility options to see what has been turned on. Nothing has
been turned on; everything is as it was before. I turn on then turn off
"magnifier" to see if that fixes things. Nope. I look thru help, incl.
KB articles to find a clue. Nothing. I was going to go thru process
explorer to see if I could identify the offending process, but the icon
for it was gone from the desktop. So now I am pissed off.

So I restart into last known good, which should have been yesterday. No
joy. The distorted taskbar comes back and the icons are still missing
from the desktop. Finally, a system restore to yesterday fixed things.

But I never did find out the cause. Anyone ever run into this and did
discover the cause? And let me repeat for emphasis: no accessibility
options were visibly turned on.

Thanks!
Mike
x-posted to alt.comp.hardware
Click to expand...


Maybe some keyboard shortcut you incidentally pressed ? I remember something
about pressing the SHIFT key for more than 5 seconds.


Matthias
 
MF said:
Writing email. Pushed the shift button, then started thinking things over.
"blurp" says windows (XP SP2) and up comes the little dialog asking about
Accessibility Options. Without paying much attention, I clicked cancel, as
I have done dozens of times.

Well, something didn't cancel. I go back to the email and notice that the
caps lock and shift keys aren't working properly. (capslock turned on gives
lower case, turned off it gives upper case, and the shift keys don't work at
all. The number pad keys aren't working. I go back to the desktop and see
that the task bar has doubled in size, the icons on taskbar and systray have
doubled in size and are out of focus, as if resolution had been decreased to
a minimum, and I have lost the bottom row of icons on the desktop itself.
The desktop icons have remained the same size.

So I go thru start menu and task bar properties. Nothing has changed. I go
through language and keyboard settings. Nothing has changed. I go through
accessibility options to see what has been turned on. Nothing has been
turned on; everything is as it was before. I turn on then turn off
"magnifier" to see if that fixes things. Nope. I look thru help, incl. KB
articles to find a clue. Nothing. I was going to go thru process explorer
to see if I could identify the offending process, but the icon for it was
gone from the desktop. So now I am pissed off.

So I restart into last known good, which should have been yesterday. No
joy. The distorted taskbar comes back and the icons are still missing from
the desktop. Finally, a system restore to yesterday fixed things.

But I never did find out the cause. Anyone ever run into this and did
discover the cause? And let me repeat for emphasis: no accessibility
options were visibly turned on.

Thanks!
Mike
x-posted to alt.comp.hardware
Click to expand...

I've seen 2 similar things..

what happened to you, I think is a win xp "feature" called Sticky
Keys.
I wont' try it now 'cos i have things open.. But I think if you hold
SHIFT for 5 seconds (maybe without another letter), then it turns on.
It sort of automatically holds down CTRL SHIFT or ALT for you.. Which
is a nuisance 'cos when you type on the keyboard , since you're noe
effectively holding down very functional keys, all hell breaks lose and
you're actually runing a load of win xp shortcuts. I think i've foudn
emails getting sent as i'm typing them.. (maybe that was why I stopped
using outlook).. . The focus goes all over the place things get
closed. it's horrible.. At one point I just stop risking pressing more
keys, and restart with the mouse - which still works!.. But you can
disable it

I guess to disable stickykeys, go to ctrl panel..accesibilty options..
and you see sticky keys there.. it may be unchecekd, but there's a
setings within that with checkboxes, maybe uncheck those too. It's
worth knowing that the default settings say that if 2 keys are pressed
at once turns stickkeys off


Another very similar nuisance is . Usiing your RIGHT CTRL and RIGHT
SHIFT . Hold RIGHT CTRL and while yo're holding it, tap RIGHT SHIFT.
Then release both. i.e. RIGHT CTRL+RIGHT SHIFT. (like one might do
CTRL-Z)

All the text gets flushed right.. the left arrow goes right, the right
arrow goes left. Windows acts like it acts when you're writing a
langauge that goes from right to left.. Which is a pain even in a right
to left language. But even mroe stupid when writing english.
THe key is to know how to reverse it to normal. Do the same , but with
the LEFT. i.e. LEFT CONTROL+LEFT SHIFT.
 
MF said:
Writing email. Pushed the shift button, then started thinking things over.
"blurp" says windows (XP SP2) and up comes the little dialog asking about
Accessibility Options. Without paying much attention, I clicked cancel, as
I have done dozens of times.

Well, something didn't cancel. I go back to the email and notice that the
caps lock and shift keys aren't working properly. (capslock turned on gives
lower case, turned off it gives upper case, and the shift keys don't work at
all. The number pad keys aren't working. I go back to the desktop and see
that the task bar has doubled in size, the icons on taskbar and systray have
doubled in size and are out of focus, as if resolution had been decreased to
a minimum, and I have lost the bottom row of icons on the desktop itself.
The desktop icons have remained the same size.

So I go thru start menu and task bar properties. Nothing has changed. I go
through language and keyboard settings. Nothing has changed. I go through
accessibility options to see what has been turned on. Nothing has been
turned on; everything is as it was before. I turn on then turn off
"magnifier" to see if that fixes things. Nope. I look thru help, incl. KB
articles to find a clue. Nothing. I was going to go thru process explorer
to see if I could identify the offending process, but the icon for it was
gone from the desktop. So now I am pissed off.

So I restart into last known good, which should have been yesterday. No
joy. The distorted taskbar comes back and the icons are still missing from
the desktop. Finally, a system restore to yesterday fixed things.

But I never did find out the cause. Anyone ever run into this and did
discover the cause? And let me repeat for emphasis: no accessibility
options were visibly turned on.

Thanks!
Mike
x-posted to alt.comp.hardware
Click to expand...

I see plenty of potential distortions mentioned on this page. There
is a control panel called Accessibility and it may have something to
do with it. Maybe you can experiment with the Control Panel, and see
if the Registry or something else is changed, when the panel is changed.

(I used the archived version, to try to get the pictures on the page to appear.)
http://web.archive.org/web/20040903...alowsoftware.com/accessibility/AccArticle.htm

Paul
 
PaDiQ said:
maybe keyboard is broken.....maybe shift button is broken...
Click to expand...

the proof this isn't the case is that the functionality is fine after
restarting windows.

it's the standard sticky keys problem.. SHIFT for 5 seconds.. though
when I look at the settings it says press SHIFT 5 times - an
improvement!. Somebody else mentioned 5 seconds so it's not my
imagination. I guess it was at one time. I don't know when MS changed
it. But it'd explain why it hasn't happened to me recently. At the
moment i'm using sp2 no updates. So maybe sp1 was shift 5 seconds. But
the OP said this happened on sp2, so i don't see how he activated it,
if he pressed SHIFT 5 times, but that's unusual. I thin kyou have
toppress it 5 times without another key, just trying it now!
 
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