Help Editing Softkeys

[Kuwanjahbee]

Had my captivate for a month now(not rooted). I am really enjoying it as my first smart phone and the customization (Zeam launcher, Handcent SMS, etc) is really great. One thing that bugs me though are the soft keys. The way it is set up mainly. Why is the home key between the back and the menu button? and why do i need a search button. I understand the droid is google based, but really? why does it need a button dedicated to it.

So my question is with a rooted phone can you change the function of the softkeys so i could have the search key do something different when pressed.

 

[jburbrink]

I have an app "quick settings" from the market and when I long press the search key it allows me to choose the app as my default when long pressing that key. Combined with swipe gestures on my laucher pro dock, it helps keep my homescreen uncluttered. As far as a tap touch for that key, I haven't found anything.

 

[falcon7204]

I have an app "quick settings" from the market and when I long press the search key it allows me to choose the app as my default when long pressing that key. Combined with swipe gestures on my laucher pro dock, it helps keep my homescreen uncluttered. As far as a tap touch for that key, I haven't found anything.

A buddy of mine set up his Captivate so that his search hard key actually locks the phone! His on/off button is worn out, so he rerouted his lock function to the search button.

Quick Settings doesn't do that for me. It doesn't really control the hard keys at all. In fact, by long-pressing the search key you get the same dialog box when Quick Settings isn't running as you do when it is.

What I want to do is figure out how he did it - without having to go back and ask him. Obviously I will if I need to, but we're both pretty busy at work and we have better things to do than play with our phones. So, does anyone else have a method for doing this?

(BTW, I'm willing to root the phone if need be, but he says his isn't rooted, so obviously there's a way to do it...)

Tech info: Captivate running GB 2.3.5 unrooted KK4 kernel