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Problem

I cannot press Shift+` on my PC to create the tilde character. This problem happens with both my physical keyboard and the on-screen keyboard. If I plug my physical keyboard into another computer, it works fine.

Troubleshooting

Language Switcher Keys

A common solution I see posted is that people have completely disabled their backtick key to allow them to switch languages. That is not my problem:

Language switcher keys are disabled

Shortcut (.lnk) keyboard shortcut

Someone else recommended using a tool to find shortcuts (.lnk files) with keyboard shortcuts set up on them. This tool has not found anything.

Shortcut Key Explorer comes up empty

Spy++

I have tried using Spy++ to track down which window is intercepting the key as a hotkey. I found solutions like this one recommending this approach.

And this does indeed show that the key combo is being intercepted as a hotkey:

a list of WM_HOTKEY messages from Spy++

but if I follow the links through this tool to find the specific Window + Process, it just points to "Explorer". I don't know where to go from here:

WM_HOTKEY message properties

Window Properties

Process Properties

UPDATE:

Safe Mode

I had tried this before when I last tried troubleshooting this issue but I tried it again: Safe Mode does not fix the issue. If I boot into safe mode, I still cannot type the tilde.

OpenArk

I found another resource that recommended a program called OpenArk. I was a bit wary of this but it seems to play nice. I ran the tool to detect hotkeys and it did indeed find the hotkey registered. And to be clear, it is C:\Windows\explorer.exe and not some fake one, as far as I can tell:

explorer.exe has registered Shift+Oem3

This tool lets me delete the hotkey from the registry - and this actually worked!!! ~~~~~~~~ I'm typing these right now from the problem PC!

The problem though is that if I restart my computer, the hotkey comes back. So it's a temporary fix but not one I'm satisfied with. But I think it confirms that it's definitely some hotkey at play.

Next I'd like to figure out what is registering the hotkey to begin with. Is there perhaps a mechanism to log which processes are registering hotkeys?

Zach Thacker
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  • The ~ key can be used to write ñ. If you press ~n do you get the ñ? If so, your keyboard language is set to an international standard such as US international. If you add US and switch to that, I suspect the ~ key to work normally. – LPChip Feb 16 '24 at 08:38
  • What happens if you press Shift+` twice? – harrymc Feb 16 '24 at 10:32
  • @LPChip that does not happen. I am going to press those keystrokes now: n. – Zach Thacker Feb 16 '24 at 14:56
  • @harrymc nothing happens. two separate hotkey events are registered in Spy++ when I do that. – Zach Thacker Feb 16 '24 at 14:57
  • Does this happen if booting in Safe mode? – harrymc Feb 16 '24 at 15:03
  • In Task Manager, Details, look for any process that might be stealing those key codes. You can kill a suspicious process and test tilde. – DrMoishe Pippik Feb 16 '24 at 17:33
  • @harrymc it still happens in safe mode, just tried it. – Zach Thacker Feb 16 '24 at 18:52
  • @DrMoishePippik the issue I have is that it appears to be the explorer process itself that has bound the hotkey. I have found that using these third party tools that show it is the process intercepting the hotkey message. – Zach Thacker Feb 16 '24 at 18:52
  • Added some additional troubleshooting steps, including a temporary fix - I found a tool that lets me delete the hotkey, but it comes back when I restart my PC. now I just need to figure out what's setting it. – Zach Thacker Feb 16 '24 at 19:01
  • Which tool is that? – harrymc Feb 16 '24 at 19:03
  • details are in the OP :) but it's OpenArk64 – Zach Thacker Feb 16 '24 at 19:05
  • What is your language and keyboard layout? Do you know what registry modification is done by OpenArk64? – harrymc Feb 16 '24 at 20:05
  • @harrymc english, US qwerty. I looked into the code of OpenArk, I'm not super familiar with its domain and the APIs it's working with but it appears to me that it's just clearing the individual hotkey registration with the running process. And I can kinda confirm that because if I manually restart explorer.exe, the hotkey comes back and I can't type tilde anymore. – Zach Thacker Feb 17 '24 at 02:34
  • It seems like some tool integrates into explorer and sets up a dynamic keyboard hook. Perhaps ShellExView could find more info. A pity that OpenArk64 doesn't give any hint of what it's actually eradicating. – harrymc Feb 17 '24 at 08:57
  • You can use a program like SharpKeys to see whether the key is assigned the same way in both computers: Screenshot SharpKeys. – Relax Feb 17 '24 at 11:57

1 Answers1

3

Xbox Game Bar was configured with the hotkey.

I saw someone recommend checking Xbox Game Bar for shortcuts. And sure enough, I found the shortcut for Shift+` was set up on the game bar

I don't remember setting this up, perhaps I fat-fingered something. I also checked this screen multiple times - but there is a SCROLL BAR very subtly hidden on the right side of the dialog. This screenshot shows how the window looked to me when I opened it just now and happened to finally notice the scroll bar:

ugh

And if I scroll down...

there it is in all of its fine glory

I'm very annoyed but also very glad to have finally found this!

Zach Thacker
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