SynapticsTouchpadHowTo
For Newbies
On laptops, the touchpad is the built-in mouse. "Synaptics touchpad" should not be confused with "Synaptic", the Ubuntu Package Manager, or Graphical User Interface equivalent of "apt-get" in a terminal.
In Breezy and later versions of Ubuntu, laptops with a synaptics touchpad should work out of the box. Go to a terminal and grep (look inside) your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file:
grep Id /etc/X11/xorg.conf
If one of the lines is:
Identifier "Synaptics Touchpad"
then you have a Synaptics Touchpad.
Turning Synaptics Touchpads On/Off
You may wish to turn the touchpad on or off so that it doesn't interfere with typing when using a USB or other mouse.
KSynaptics should allow KDE users some control over their touchpad, though issues may exist:
In Ubuntu, use following steps:
Step 1
from a terminal, edit /etc/xorg.conf
sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf
and look for the following section of code:
Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Synaptics Touchpad" Driver "synaptics" Option "SendCoreEvents" "true" Option "Device" "/dev/psaux" Option "Protocol" "auto-dev" Option "HorizScrollDelta" "0" EndSection
and add one more Option at the End of the Section:
Option "SHMConfig" "on" EndSection
Step 2
Next we will create 3 files - a bash script to turn the touchpad on, one to turn it on, and a python script to use a single key combination for both. At a terminal, cd to /usr/local/bin and make a new file:
cd /usr/local/bin sudo gedit tpoff
and paste the following code in the file, save it and close it.
# synclient touchpadoff=1
again, make a new file:
sudo gedit tpon
paste the following, save and close:
# synclient touchpadoff=0
once again, make a new file:
sudo gedit touchpad.py
paste the following, save and close
import os import string def ReadFile(): myfile = open('/tmp/synclient.tmp', 'rb') for line in myfile: TestString(line) myfile.close() def TestString(string): for word in string.split(): if word == "TouchpadOff": setting = string.split() ChangeState(setting[2]) def ChangeState(current): if current == "0": os.system("synclient touchpadoff=1") else: os.system("synclient touchpadoff=0") os.system("rm /tmp/synclient.tmp") def Main(): ReadFile() os.system("synclient -l > /tmp/synclient.tmp") Main()
and finally, change the permissions of these three files:
sudo chmod 777 tpon tpoff touchpad.py
Step 3
Next, edit your sudoers files to allow you to execute both scripts without a password.
sudo visudo
and add this line
{user} ALL = NOPASSWD: /usr/local/bin/touchpad.py
where {user} is your user name
save (in nano hit <CTRL> <o>), and make sure to save it as: /etc/sudoers
Step 4 Next, install xbindkeys
sudo apt-get install xbindkeys
when it's done, install xbindkeys-config, the GUI for xbindkeys
sudo apt-get install xbindkeys-config
once each is installed, start both applications:
xbindkeys
and
xbindkeys-config
edit your file to the shortcut key you want. For example, to be able to switch the touchpad on/off by <Ctrl><F5>, fill in the following, under Edit:
Name: Touchpad On/Off Key: Control + F5 | m:0x4 + c:71 Action: /usr/local/bin/touchpad.py
then click apply & save & exit
Now that that is done, restart xbindkeys:
xbindkeys
You may need to restart X.
Remember that each time you restart X, you will need to run xbindkeys again in order for the shortcut to work. (if anyone knows how to have it autrun, please let ["brallan" me] know and i'll include it here...
Turning On/Off tapping on a synaptics touchpad
== Turning On/Off the touchpad but leaving the