19Nov/080
Special keys stops working while using VMware
Has it occured to you that when you're using VMware Workstation or Server that CTRL, ALT and SHIFT stops working? When this first started happening to me, I just restarted X to fix the problem. As you probably know, this is not a good solution
If you however try executing setxkbmap once this problem occurs, you should gain control over the keys again. This did at least work for me 