Linux Mint + Toshiba laptop : can't adjust brightness with Fn keys / keyboard

This is not an uncommon problem.  For me if I try to use the Fn + brightness up/down keys a popup appears showing the battery status.  After some Googling I found several results, which worked for many people but did nothing for me.  My fallback trick of adjusting the brightness before the OS boots didn't work either.  Fortunately I found this command in buried in the comments somewhere and it works fine.

SUDO'd

echo 160 | sudo tee /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness > /dev/null

That's pretty dim.  For slightly brighter pick a higher number

echo 260 | sudo tee /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness > /dev/null

While you're at it might as well install GTK Redshit to save your eyes some at night.

ROOT

dim 

echo 160 | tee /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness > /dev/null

brighter

echo 260 | tee /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness > /dev/null

This also seems to work on Debian and CentOS.