Karabiner Elements to the Rescue

After an unexplained failure of a previous workflow, I used the free keyboard mapping utility, Karabiner Elements, to reenable my hyperkey and turn of CapsLock when macOS baled at letting me do it.

I use the hyperkey concept heavily in my various workflows.  A hyperkey is when you change your keyboard mapping so that pressing the CapsLock key acts the same as simultaneously pressing the Shift+Control+Option+Command keys. It essentially creates a new modifier key you can use for keyboard shortcuts. I use my hyperkey+a letter to launch a great many apps and to access things like the Bartender menu. I normally set it up through Better Touch Tool but there are stand-alone apps that will do it too, like Superkey. Tonight, out of the blue, my hyperkey stopped working and CapsLock, which I had turned off in System Settings was turned back on. I managed to get my hyperkey working again, but my M2 MacBook Air ignored system settings and would not disable CapsLock. 

The solution for me, was Karabiner Elements, a powerful keyboard customizer for macOS. Karabiner Elements supports a great many customizations, including things like:

• Creating a diamond cursor
• Emacs key bindings anywhere
• Vi key bindings
• Preventing accidental command+q app quitting
• Mouse keys

It also has a large library of keyboard customizations written by its community of users that you can download and install.

Karabiner Elements is free. You can download it from the developer's website.