Can you HOLD the Apple Command key?

[ambor]

Trying to use the Key Croc for an entirely simple purpose... to put a Mac automatically into recovery mode on a reboot (https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT201314). This is done by rebooting and then holding the COMMAND-R keys until a certain point. I just need the Key Croc to make the Mac see the COMMAND-R. This is being used in conjunction with a KVM to remotely re-build machines that are not easily accessible. The KVM can't send the correct keycode to invoke Recovery Mode and I was hoping that a KeyCroc could fake it a bit better.

Something like this would be great - but you can't HOLD the CMD-R (and even with that attack mode command the Mac doesn't see the device as a genuine Apple keyboard)

ATTACKMODE HID VID_0X05AC PID_0X0220
HOLD CMD-R

Any ideas?

 

[Darren Kitchen]

Try the QUACK HOLD command, but that might do it. I'll give it a shot soon. See the section on HOLD and RELEASE at https://docs.hak5.org/hc/en-us/articles/360047381354-QUACK-and-Ducky-Script-2-0

Essentially you'd want to determine the scan code from the language json and pass it to QUACK HOLD. It looks like COMMAND-r from the us.json is 12,00,15 – so the command would be:

QUACK HOLD 12,00,15
QUACK DELAY 5000
QUACK RELEASE

That would hold COMMAND-r for 5 seconds.

[ambor]

It looks like the COMMAND keys from us.json actually send a "CONTROL-SHIFT" on a Mac. Instead the GUI in us.json seems to be the macOS COMMAND key on the keyboard.

But it seems that the HOLD function is not working right... if I run the following (using command-s instead of r, but should make no diff)...  it doesn't do anything

ATTACKMODE HID VID_0X05AC PID_0X0220 MAN_APPLE SN_0
QUACK HOLD 08,00,16
QUACK DELAY 5000
QUACK RELEASE

But this seems to work

QUACK GUI-s

Of course I'd like it to be held rather than just pressed for an instant.

[Aaron Outhier]

I wonder if the problem you are having has anything to do with the boot delay inherent in operating the KeyCroc. Basically, since the KeyCroc is an embedded Linux device, it takes about 15-20 seconds after the host computer turns on before the Croc will “do” anything. The MAC has only a limited window to hold down the CMD-R combo before continuing normal boot-up. As such, by the time the Croc “boots”, it might be too late to enter recovery.

If you have access to a USB Y-adapter, such as the one that ships with the WiFi Pineapple Nano, you could try using that along with a USB power brick, so that you can make the KeyCroc power up first, and then power on the Mac. I hope that makes sense?