Karabiner-elements: Reloading complex modifications

[carymrobbins]

In order to reload complex modifications, I have to open up the Karabiner-Elements GUI, remove my rule, then re-add it. Is there a better way to do this? Ideally, I'd like to be able to do this from a command line script or a hot key (which may be script + karabiner).

[ww7]

Any solutions for this?

[dyyybek]

Is there any solution for this?

[raine]

Would be useful.

[stale[bot]]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.

[carymrobbins]

Resurrecting as I'm still interested in this.

[sixpetrov]

I would really like that feature, it's painful to do any change, but maybe this could help:
https://github.com/tekezo/Karabiner-Elements/issues/217#issuecomment-250956515

[svermeulen]

Just another vote for this feature. Having to add and remove from the UI every time a change is made to the json is really painful

[svermeulen]

I ended up creating a hammerspoon binding to automate the reload through the gui. Super hacky and brittle but still a bit helpful

[et304383]

Sure would be nice to have this.

[ionstormx]

Upvote. Hoping to see this someday.

[24khxn]

Bumping because I still have interest in this

[denolfe]

I ran into this after moving my modifications out of karabiner.json into the complex modifications directory. It would be really great if this were implemented.

Previously, I was performing this snippet in a Makefile to do the reload of karabiner.json:

launchctl stop org.pqrs.karabiner.karabiner_console_user_server
sleep 0.2
start org.pqrs.karabiner.karabiner_console_user_server

It doesn't appear to work for the complex modifications though.

[wookayin]

Can we have this reopened, please?

p.s. I personally don't like stalebot keeping non-resolved long-standing issues :D

[wookayin]

This worked for me (just kill Karabiner-Elements and launch it again; bring up the window to validate refreshing). I did not have to run launchctl though. Let me note here for somebody who might find this issue by Googling.

killall Karabiner-Elements; open /Applications/Karabiner-Elements.app

For example, if you are managing it in VCS, you can automate deploying Karabiner configs and reloading them like:

#!/bin/bash
# Copy karabiner.json if you are managing it in VCS. Locations are YMMV. Note that Karabiner messes up symbolic links.
\cp -f ~/.dotfiles/config/karabiner/karabiner.json ~/.config/karabiner/karabiner.json
killall Karabiner-Elements; open /Applications/Karabiner-Elements.app

[svermeulen]

@wookayin's suggestion still doesn't work for me

Still hoping one day we'll see a way to do this. I find it surprising that a tool built for automation would not have a way to automate something as simple as restarting it or reloading config

[et304383]

This feature would be greatly appreciated. It's such a cumbersome way to reload we have to go through today.

[babygau]

you all should use GokuRakuJoudo to config karabiner. it's simple and make changes instantly.