Synaptics TouchPad driver for XFree86 ------------------------------------- Introduction ------------ This is a driver for the Synaptics TouchPad for XFree86 4.x. A Synaptics touchpad by default operates in compatibility mode by emulating a standard mouse. However, by using a dedicated driver, more advance features of the touchpad becomes available, such as: - Movement with adjustable, non-linear acceleration and speed. - Button events through short touching of the touchpad. - Double-Button events through double short touching of the touchpad. - Dragging through short touching and holding down the finger on the touchpad. - Middle and right button events on the upper and lower corner of the touchpad. - Vertical scrolling (button four and five events) through moving the finger on the right side of the touchpad. - The up/down button sends button four/five events. - Horizontal scrolling (button six and seven events) through moving the finger on the lower side of the touchpad. - The multi-buttons send button four/five events, and six/seven events for horizontal scrolling. - Adjustable finger detection. - Multifinger taps: two finger for middle button and three finger for right button events. (Needs hardware support. Not all models implement this feature.) - Run-time configuration using shared memory. This means you can change parameter settings without restarting the X server. Note that depending on the touchpad firmware, some of these features might be available even without using the synaptics driver. Note also that some functions are not available on all touchpad models, because they need support from the touchpad hardware/firmware. (Multifinger taps for example.) Installation ------------ See the INSTALL file for detailed installation instructions. Compatibility ------------- The driver has been reported to work on a number of different laptop computers. See the COMPATIBILITY file for the list. If your computer is not listed, please let me (petero2@telia.com) know if the driver works on your computer. Parameters ---------- The driver behavior can be configured with parameters. These parameters are options in the InputDevice section in the XFree86 config file. See the INSTALL file for a working example. If you have the SHMConfig parameter enabled, these parameters can also be changed at runtime with the synclient program. Parameter: Type: Description: Device String Synaptics device Protocol String "auto-dev" (automatic, default), "psaux" (raw) or "event" (linux 2.5 kernel events) SHMConfig Bool switch on/off shared memory for configuration LeftEdge Int coordinates for left edge RightEdge Int coordinates for right edge TopEdge Int coordinates for top edge BottomEdge Int coordinates for bottom edge FingerLow Int When finger pressure drops below this value, the driver counts it as a release. FingerHigh Int When finger pressure goes above this value, the driver counts it as a touch. MaxTapTime Int max. time (in milliseconds) for detecting a tap MaxTapMove Int max. movement of the finger for detecting a tap VertScrollDelta Int move distance of the finger for a scroll event HorizScrollDelta Int move distance of the finger for a scroll event EdgeMotionSpeed Int edge motion speed when dragging Repeater String repeater device MinSpeed Float min. Speed factor MaxSpeed Float max. Speed factor AccelFactor Float acceleration factor UpDownScrolling Bool If on, the up/down buttons generate button 4/5 events. If off, the up button generates a double click and the down button generates a button 2 event. EmulateMidButtonTime Int max time (in milliseconds) for middle button emulation. TouchpadOff Bool If on, the Touchpad is switched off (useful if an external mouse is connected) LockedDrags Bool If off, a tap and drag gesture ends when you release the finger. If on, the gesture is active until you tap a second time. RTCornerButton Int Which mouse button is reported on a right top corner tap 0=No action, 1=Left Button, 2=Middle Button, 3=Right Button RBCornerButton Int Which mouse button is reported on a right bottom corner tap 0=No action, 1=Left Button, 2=Middle Button, 3=Right Button LTCornerButton Int Which mouse button is reported on a left top corner tap 0=No action, 1=Left Button, 2=Middle Button, 3=Right Button LBCornerButton Int Which mouse button is reported on a left bottom corner tap 0=No action, 1=Left Button, 2=Middle Button, 3=Right Button TapButton1 Int Which mouse button is reported on a non-corner one-finger tap 0=No action, 1=Left Button, 2=Middle Button, 3=Right Button TapButton2 Int Which mouse button is reported on a non-corner two-finger tap 0=No action, 1=Left Button, 2=Middle Button, 3=Right Button TapButton3 Int Which mouse button is reported on a non-corner three-finger tap 0=No action, 1=Left Button, 2=Middle Button, 3=Right Button CircularScrolling Bool If on, circular scrolling is used (see below) CircScrollDelta Float Move angle (radians) of finger to generate a scroll event CircScrollTrigger Int Trigger region on the touchpad to start circular scrolling 0=All Edges, 1=Top Edge, 2=Top Right Corner, 3=Right Edge, 4=Bottom Right Corner, 5=Bottom Edge, 6=Bottom Left Corner, 7=Left Edge, 8=Top Left Corner A tap event happens when the finger is touched and released in a time interval shorter than MaxTapTime, and the touch and release coordinates are less than MaxTapMove units apart. A "touch" event happens when the Z value goes above FingerHigh, and an "untouch" event happens when the Z value goes below FingerLow. The MinSpeed, MaxSpeed and AccelFactor parameters control the pointer motion speed. The speed value defines the scaling between touchpad coordinates and screen coordinates. When moving the finger very slowly, the MinSpeed value is used, when moving very fast the MaxSpeed value is used. When moving the finger at moderate speed, you get a pointer motion speed somewhere between MinSpeed and MaxSpeed. If you don't want any acceleration, set MinSpeed and MaxSpeed to the same value. The MinSpeed, MaxSpeed and AccelFactor parameters don't have any effect on scrolling speed. Scrolling speed is determined solely from the VertScrollDelta and HorizScrollDelta parameters. Since synaptics touchpads don't have a button that corresponds to the middle button on a mouse, the driver can emulate middle mouse button events. If you press both the left and right mouse buttons at almost the same time (no more than EmulateMidButtonTime milliseconds apart) the driver generates a middle mouse button event. Circular scrolling acts like a scrolling wheel on the trackpad. Scrolling is engaged when a drag starts in the given CircScrollTrigger region, which can be all edges, a particular side, or a particular corner. Once scrolling is engaged, moving your finger in clockwise circles around the trackpad will generate scroll down events and counter clockwise scroll up events. Lifting your finger will disengage circular scrolling. Use tight circles near the center of the pad for fast scrolling and large circles for better control. FAQ --- * Is this free software? Yes, the source code is released under the GNU General Public License. * How do I use this driver with Linux kernel 2.6.x? You need kernel 2.6.0-test6 or later and version 0.11.7 or later of the XFree86 driver. You need to have the "evdev" driver loaded or compiled into the kernel (CONFIG_INPUT_EVDEV). Set the "Protocol" parameter in the X configuration file to "auto-dev". Also, if you set the "Device" parameter to "/dev/psaux", the same X configuration file should work for a 2.4.x kernel. When configuring the kernel, enable PS/2 mouse support (CONFIG_MOUSE_PS2). * It still doesn't work with a 2.6 kernel. Some distributions come with an incomplete /dev directory. The driver needs the /dev/input/eventX device nodes. Try to create them manually if they don't exist already. (Look at /proc/bus/input/devices to figure out how many nodes you need.) # mknod /dev/input/event0 c 13 64 # mknod /dev/input/event1 c 13 65 # mknod /dev/input/event2 c 13 66 ... * How can I configure tap-to-click behavior? If you set MaxTapTime=0 then the touchpad will not use tapping at all, i.e. touching/tapping will not be taken as a mouse click. If, instead, you set MaxTapMove=0, then the touchpad will not use tapping for a single finger tap (left mouse button click) but will for the two and three finger tap (middle and right button click). * Why did tap-to-click stop working after I upgraded from an old version? Time is now measured in milliseconds instead of "number of packets". In practice, this means that if you are upgrading from an old version, you need to change MaxTapTime and EmulateMidButtonTime to make "tap to click" work. Good values are 180 and 75 respectively. * Gnome scrollbars scroll too much when using tap-to-click. Why? The MaxTapTime parameter is probably too big. Try setting it to 180. Gnome scrollbars use auto repeat, ie if you press the left mouse button and keep it pressed, the scroll bar will move until you release the button. This will lead to problems if the tap time is longer than the delay before auto repeat starts. * Can the driver be used together with gpm? No, not reliably, if you are using a 2.4.x kernel. The gpm driver and the X driver both try to read data from the touchpad, and if they try to read at the same time, both drivers see incomplete data and don't know how to interpret it. If you are running a 2.6.x kernel though, there should be no conflict, because the kernel driver will make sure both user space drivers receive all events from the touchpad. * How do I compile the driver? Beginning with version 0.11.8, it should be possible to compile the driver by simply running "make". This will compile a driver for XFree86 4.2.x, which will also work for 4.3.x versions of XFree86. If you have an older version of XFree86, you will need an installed X source tree. On an RPM based distribution, you can build a suitable source tree by installing the XFree86 source RPM and compile it. For example, in RedHat 9, use the following commands: # rpm -vU XFree86-4.3.0-2.src.rpm # cd /usr/src/redhat/SPECS # rpmbuild -bb XFree86.spec Then change the TOP variable in the Makefile to match the version of XFree86 you are using. In the example above, set TOP = /usr/src/redhat/BUILD/XFree86-4.3.0/xc Authors ------- Many people have contributed to this driver. Look at the top of synaptics.c and ps2comm.c for details. The current maintainer is Peter Osterlund .