Mac FN key on M4G?

[digital slate]

Hi here, where is the Mac fn key on the M4G?
I understand how to get to the fx layer, but how can I get the alternate shift values for the Fx keys on Mac (this is typically done with the Mac FN key)

[twilit tiger]

@toxic ravine

[toxic ravine]

As far as I know those are hardware keys. To use them on any keyboard besides the Mac ones, you'd need to rebind them. Supposedly you can do so in System Preferences -> Keyboard -> Keyboard shortcuts -> Function keys

[digital slate]

Oh, I think I see what you’re saying. The FN key gives access to functions such as screen brightness, mission control, applications, media transport, etc. So not an ASCII value as such.
I’m not entirely sure I’d want to rebind them as I’d still like to use the laptop keyboard (and not the M4G exclusively). I’ll have a think and a play. Maybe I can assign a key combination (e.g. CTRL+Fx) and intercept with a utility like Keyboard Maestro or Karabiner.
Other than that, I’ll do some research to see what keyboards are actually outputting (given that any 3rd party Mac capable keyboard has this function) and see if this can be output by the M4G.

[polar owl]

If we can output midi notes on the CCx/M4G, Keyboard Maestro can take them as input, giving access to far more function/macro keys

[shadow kelp]

I can't get this to work, @aphit's instructions don't work sadly

I'm looking for the globe key.

[digital slate]

@shadow kelp, I agree. The globe key (also seen as fn on other keyboards) does not seem to be mapped to anything I can find on the Charachorder (when going through possible available inputs within chord manager).
Following Aphit's instruction above, I get to the Mac settings menu, but Function keys is simply an on/off toggle (to prefer F-keys over system controls/media transport/etc).
Looking at modifier keys, you can select the CC M4G as the keyboard, however there's not much you can really do here, apart from remap modifiers to other modifiers. Again, Globe key is shown here, but without this being an option on the Charachorder itself, you can't actually trigger it.

[stone yacht]

In this thread one person says: https://talk.macpowerusers.com/t/can-you-map-the-globe-key-to-a-non-apple-keyboards/33442/4

The solution that worked for me: in macOS Sonoma 14.5, System Settings, Keyboard, Keyboard Shortcuts, Modifier Keys, I changed the Caps Lock key to behave as the fn Function key and it started to behave like the globe key. Perhaps remapping another key to the fn Function key would also work.

The Apple fn key works differently than other fn keys on keyboards because it actually gets sent on the wire. This has cause great workarounds to become necessary. Interesting discussion here https://gist.github.com/fauxpark/010dcf5d6377c3a71ac98ce37414c6c4

Another person said:

I’m aware of that option, but it only assigns the fn function and that is not the same as what the globe key does. The globe key gives access to other keyboard shortcuts and that is not what assigning the fn function to capslock does. For example globe key + q opens a new quick note.

The first person responded:

It actually does work exactly like the globe key when reassigned. I use it often to invoke the emoji and symbols window. I just successfully tried it with caps + q to open a new quick note and caps + s to invoke Siri.

[shadow kelp]

that's a pretty good hack