Software-based KVM Switcher for OSX. Simulates the double scroll lock LED toggle necessary to switch most KVMs.
Huge shoutout to damieng for his work on setledsmac.
Tested and verified working through OSX 11.2 Big Sur. If you'd like to test on other versions, let me know if it does or doesn't work for you!
Download and extract, open terminal, cd
to the extracted folder, and execute ./kvmswitch
. Or, set up a keyboard shortcut to trigger via hotkey.
kvmswitch
file to /Users/<your username>/bin/
(create this folder if it doesn't exist)Switch KVM.workflow
file/Users/<your username>/bin/
, right-click the Switch KVM.workflowflow
file and click Open With > Automator.app, change ~/bin/kvmswitch to your new path, then click File > Save (⌘S). Proceed from step 2 above as normal.
Most KVM switches monitor the state of the connected keyboard's scroll lock LED to use as its signal-switching "hotkey" input. Unfortunately, MacOS will often remap the key (F14) on external keyboards to decrease the display brightness, and does not support the necessary scroll lock LED toggle – until now. By employing the functionality of damieng's setledsmac, we can quickly toggle the state of this LED in order to emulate the necessary KVM-switching signal.
The kvmswitch
script spawns a new file, kvmleds
which it uses to control keyboard LEDs, then toggles the scroll lock key 3 times in rapid succession (2 times to trigger the switch, then once more in case the first did not register).