touchpad setting are non-active in 42.2

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#1

Greetings!

Could you please help me with touchpad settings in OpenSuse 42.2 KDE 64 bit? I want to change 2-finger tap settings, but these checkboxes are permanently non-active in systems settings, whether I tick “Mouse click emulation” or not. How could I make them active?

Best regards,
Oleksii

#2

Not sure this is your case, but if your 42.2 system was upgraded from an original 42.1 install maybe you have conflicting libinput and synaptics packages.
Please check that xf86-input-libinput IS installed and that xf86-input-synaptics IS NOT installed.
To do so you may open a terminal and issue the command:


zypper --no-refresh se libinput synaptics

If this is not the case, we need more info about your HW and how you installed or upgraded your system; posting the result of:


hwinfo --mouse

might help here.

#3

Thank you for advice! Actually, namely installation of xf86-input-synaptics helped and the options there were previously unavailable had become available.

Anyway, problem solved, thanks a lot for advice!

Best regards,
Oleksii

#4

For the record, the plasma packages do recommend the installation of xf86-input-synaptics meanwhile (in Factory and KDE:Frameworks5:LTS that is, that change is not in 42.2 yet, though the latter may be released as official update for 42.2 at some point).

And OTOH, current GNOME e.g. works better without xf86-input-synaptics, having it installed will even break the touchpad settings there, see the 42.2 release notes:

[FONT=inherit][FONT=inherit][FONT=inherit][FONT=inherit]2.1.4 Synaptics X Driver Can Degrade Touchpad Experience Under GNOME[/FONT][/FONT]
[/FONT]
In Leap 42.1, the Synaptics X driver (package [FONT=DejaVu Sans Mono]xf86-input-synaptics) was installed by default but had a lower priority than the libinput driver (xf86-input-libinput).[/FONT]
Starting with Leap 42.2:

  • [FONT=inherit]The Synaptics X driver is no longer installed by default.
  • If the Synaptics X driver is installed, it will take precedence for any touchpad devices.
  • The Synaptics X driver is no longer supported by GNOME. This means when the driver is installed, Synaptics touchpads can only be configured to the extent that a basic mouse can.

[/FONT]
Unless you are using a Synaptics touchpad and have a large amount of custom configuration for the Synaptics driver, remove the package from your system:
sudo zypper rm xf86-input-synaptics
[/FONT]

https://doc.opensuse.org/release-notes/x86_64/openSUSE/Leap/42.2/#sec.upgrade.synaptics

So there’s no easy solution currently… :\

OTOH, this should be “fixed” by the new input config module for Plasma that is coming up (which will improve support for xf86-input-libinput).
I think it is already available in Plasma 5.9 beta, but that’s not an option for 42.2 though (unless you add additional repos).

#5

Hi,

Just to know. I did a new install on my laptop; Leap 42.2 + Mate.
xf86-input-synaptics is NOT installed

grep "Using input driver" /var/log/Xorg.0.log
    46.340] (II) Using input driver 'libinput' for 'Power Button'
    46.407] (II) Using input driver 'libinput' for 'Video Bus'
    46.464] (II) Using input driver 'libinput' for 'Sleep Button'
    46.492] (II) Using input driver 'libinput' for 'AT Translated Set 2 keyboard'
    46.555] (II) Using input driver 'libinput' for 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad'
    46.594] (II) Using input driver 'libinput' for 'HP WMI hotkeys'

I don’t have the usual tab for the touchpad, only “General” tab in Mouse menu.

Do you think this is the same issue?
When this will be fixed? 2 fingers scroll doesn’t work properly.

Thanks

#6

This thread is/was about KDE’s settings.
I have no idea how to configure a touchpad in Mate.
Maybe you need to install some additional package to get touchpad settings.

You may try to install xf86-input-synaptics, but I have no idea if it would help (in Mate).

#7

I am not at all an expert with MATE but AFAIK MATE is based on Gnome and they say to NOT install synaptics.
So I’ll avoid
I’ll open a new thread for this issue if I don’t find a fix.
Thanks