BigKeysLX UK Keyboard Layout for Mac OSX

I recently purchased a BigKeys LX UK Querty keyboard for a Mac and tried in vain to find a solution on the internet where I could get all keys working correctly.

The nearest I could get was the keyboard working with a US key mapping, but sadly the UK version doesn't just change the dollar sign to a pound sign, but moves around many keys as well, as you can see in the images below.

Example UK Querty keyboard layout

Example US Querty keyboard layout 

None of the keyboard layouts I tried were a 100% match, even the UK keyboard layouts built in to the Mac.  The distributors of these keyboards in the UK don't seem to really offer a solution for the Mac even though they sell the keyboards as Mac compatible. Some offer a Mac "utility" but this is hopelessly out of date and will not run on any modern Mac.

In the end, through sheer frustration, I decided to build my own keyboard mapping, which was suprisingly easy and took only a few minutes using the excellent free software called Ukelele

My finished keyboard layout for a BigKeys LX UK Querty keyboard can be downloaded here. BigKeysLXQuerty.GB.keylayout

If you have an ABC layout instead of a QUERTY layout you can open my keyboard layout in Ukelele which will give you a good starting point, and you can then simply modify it to suit. Keyboard layouts are only XML files so you can modify them with any text editor if you are that way inclined.

To install the keyboard layout:

1. Open the finder and drop the file into the folder /Library/Keyboard Layouts on your hard drive
2. Reboot the computer (keyboard layouts are only loaded at boot up time)
3. If you have a Mac OS version earlier than 10.9.1 Mavericks
   • Open System Preferences > International. Click the Input Menu tab.
   • Scroll down until you find the name of the keyboard layout you just installed. Make sure the checkbox is selected. The layout is now ready to use.
4. If you have OS 10.9.1 Mavericks or later
   • Open System Preferences >Language and Region. Click the Keyboard Preferences button at the bottom.
   • Click the Input Sources tab at the top.
   • Click the + (plus) sign at the bottom left to ‘add a keyboard layout’.
   • Select Others in the left-side pane, this should display a list of keyboard layouts which includes the one you are looking to activate. Select the keyboard you want and click add. Don’t worry if the message says ‘Keyboard layout not available’, just ignore this.
   • The layout is now ready to use.

As the BigKeys keyboard lacks an Apple/Command key, you will probably also want to map the Alt key to be your Apple/Command key. This is easily done with the following steps:

1. Open the Keyboard preferences (System Preferences / Keyboard)
2. Click on the Keyboard tab
3. Click the Modifier Keys button
4. Against the Option Key line, in the pulldown select Commnand
5. Click OK
6. Your Alt key now acts as the Apple/Command key

A note for advanced users: The name of the keyboard in your keyboard selection list will be BigKeysLXQuerty.GB. If you prefer it to be called something else, edit the file in a text editor before installing it, and change the name value in the tag on line 5.