Computer Hardware Forum

Hi !

After having a good experience with linux-2.6.11.8 under ibm t40, I
decided to use it under dell/inspiron 600m.

The problem I found is that the touchpad doesn't tap properly.  Under
linux-2.6.10 with same debian/unstable it does...

Somehow it's possible to single tap, but no way to reproduce the
tap...  double tap is not possible...  Annoying?

Any ways.  For linux-2.6.10 the touchpad is detected as follows (dmsg):

input: PS/2 Generic Mouse on isa0060/serio1

While for linux-2.6.11.8:

ALPS Touchpad (Glidepoint) detected
Disabling hardware tapping
input:  Alps PS/2 ALPS Touchpad on isa0060/serio1

In both cases the touchpad is detected on isa0060,  but in the latest
case as a touchpad and in the erliest as a generic ps/2 device.  For
the latest case it doesn't work, but for the earliest it does...

I searched the web but I got really confused...

1)  It looks like the touchpad is the one detected on linux-2.6.11.8.=20
Can some one confirm if right?  I mean, I tried to find description
from dell but didn't find it, so I'm not 100% sure...

2)  If the touchpad is not detected correctly  by linux-2.6.11.8, then
there might be a bug in the kernel but I haven't read aobut it.  I
really doubt this is the case.  But I'm not sure.  Can some one
confirm?

3)  If touchpad is detected correctly by linux-2.6.11.8, then I've
read about a lot of stuff on the web.  There are several description
for fixes, but all of them point to a kernel bug.  I didn't file the
bug filed against any kernel though.  The only filed bug is under
red-hat:  https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzill...gi?id=3D153201.
The only fix that sounds to solve the problem is provided by a
red-hat guy:  https://www.redhat.com/archives/fed...st/2005-March/=
msg00304.html.
Now I'm not sure here.  Has someone tried the previous patch?  I
looked at recently 2.6.11.9 change_log, and noting shows up there
fixing this.  Is the bug existant under the kernel archives?  Is it
planned to be solved?  Has some one successfully tried it?

4)  There's a mention of the Synaptics touch pad driver at:=20
http://web.telia.com/~u89404340/touchpad.  However it looks like it
still have problems for 2.6.11 kernels and patches are required still.
Any one has tried this synaptics driver under kernel 2.6.11.8 or
later succesfully?  Any patches applied?

OK, it was long, but I have only doubts...  So far I'm sticking to
2.6.10 kernel, however I'm afraid mechanism for the touchpad is going
to change any ways....  Maybe I'll have to wait for later kernel for
getting this working just under kernel (no synaptics driver).  If so,
has any one any idea of when is it planned to introduce the fix?  I
read change_log for 2.6.11.9, and the fix seems not to be there, and I
also read change_log for 2.6.12-rc4, and there's no reference to this
problem there either...

Thanks a lot in advance,

--=20
Javier-Elias Vasquez-Vivas

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On Sun, May 15, 2005 at 01:52:13AM -0600, Javier-Elias Vasquez-Vivas <jevv.cr@gmail.com> wro
te:
> Hi !
>
> After having a good experience with linux-2.6.11.8 under ibm t40, I
> decided to use it under dell/inspiron 600m.
>
> The problem I found is that the touchpad doesn't tap properly.  Under
> linux-2.6.10 with same debian/unstable it does...
>
> Somehow it's possible to single tap, but no way to reproduce the
> tap...  double tap is not possible...  Annoying?

I'm glad to hear I'm not crazy thinking my touchpad is acting weird
since i upgraded to 2.6.11... Though i've not investigated as far as you
did, and did not solve the problem. There are interesting informations
in your message to start investing, I might give it some try...

Mike


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I have the same problem with an old vintage Sony Vaio PCG-R505JL, From
my research in the kernel lists, it seems that, for 2.6.11 maintainer
selected to disable the hardware double tapping of Alps touchpad, in
favor of doing it by software in the driver, as the kernel message
says.

Unfotunately it does not work well for most people like us, so in new
kernel version 2.6.12, when released, the driver eill return to use
hardware tapping. Until them you can try use the psmouse proto=3Dimps,
as suggested in the Fedora list (as an option to kernel in grub or
lilo if psmouse is in kernel, or as an option to module, in
modprobe,conf). In any way for me it does not worked !?!?

ACC

On 5/15/05, Mike Hommey <mh@glandium.org> wrote:
> On Sun, May 15, 2005 at 01:52:13AM -0600, Javier-Elias Vasquez-Vivas <jev=
v.cr@gmail.com> wrote: 
>=20
> I'm glad to hear I'm not crazy thinking my touchpad is acting weird
> since i upgraded to 2.6.11... Though i've not investigated as far as you
> did, and did not solve the problem. There are interesting informations
> in your message to start investing, I might give it some try...
>=20
> Mike
>=20
> --
> To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-laptop-REQUEST@lists.debian.org
> with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster@lists.debian=
.org
>=20
>=20


--=20
A. C. Censi
accensi [em] gmail [ponto] com
accensi [em] montreal [ponto] com [ponto] br

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Very interesting and helpful.  1st thing is to say it works for my
dell inspiron 600m.  So this is a good work around...  So thanks for
the tip...

2nd thing, just to clarify, the option reverts the touchpad detection.
Instead of detecting the toucpad as "ALPS Touchpad on isa0060/serio1"
by default under 2.6.11.8, now it does it as it did under 2.6.10,
"PS/2 Generic Mouse on isa0060/serio1".  I have no problems with this,
since it's the way it was working under 2.6.10, and I was used to
it...

3rd thing, I'm implying from your reply that for some reason under
kernel 2.6.11 the touchpad detection lets say improved/changed from
just generic PS/2 device to touchpad.  However 2.6.11 kernel support
for the detected touchpad is not working yet, so it's disabled, and
the software driver must be used.  Why releasing unsupported kernel
drivers then (very interesting, it sounds like the release shoud have
been delayed until having the support)?  This also means as soon as
2.6.12 is realesed it must be tried so that touchpad detection and its
support is tried (that's the new/improved way of the kernel to deal
with the touchpad any ways), in case it comes out clean or not...  I
also imply all later versions of 2.6.11 won't solve this, only kernel
supporting touchpad or at least this one will be 2.6.12 and beyond?...
Are my implied suppositions OK?  We must see also the change_log's.=20
As stated in my 1st mail, I looked into 2.6.9 change_log, and it
doesn't say anything about mouse/touchpad drivers and the like, but I
looked into the 2.6.12-rc4 change_log, and it doesn't include anything
either, maybe the touchpad support will come later, after several
pre-releases...

Thanks a lot,

Javier.


On 5/15/05, A. C. Censi <accensi@gmail.com> wrote:
> I have the same problem with an old vintage Sony Vaio PCG-R505JL, From
> my research in the kernel lists, it seems that, for 2.6.11 maintainer
> selected to disable the hardware double tapping of Alps touchpad, in
> favor of doing it by software in the driver, as the kernel message
> says.
>=20
> Unfotunately it does not work well for most people like us, so in new
> kernel version 2.6.12, when released, the driver eill return to use
> hardware tapping. Until them you can try use the psmouse proto=3Dimps,
> as suggested in the Fedora list (as an option to kernel in grub or
> lilo if psmouse is in kernel, or as an option to module, in
> modprobe,conf). In any way for me it does not worked !?!?
>=20
> ACC
>=20
> On 5/15/05, Mike Hommey <mh@glandium.org> wrote: 
evv.cr@gmail.com> wrote:[vbcol=seagreen] 
u[vbcol=seagreen] 
an.org[vbcol=seagreen] 
>=20
> --
> A. C. Censi
> accensi [em] gmail [ponto] com
> accensi [em] montreal [ponto] com [ponto] br
>=20
>

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I forgot to ask...

Once the the support is in the kernel, what are the options for
XF86Config-4 to be given?  I guess there will be a diferent device
like /dev/input/touchpad or something, and maybe a different protocol.

Any one aware if something needs to change at all?  And if so what to
change?  I know is too early yet, but I needed to ask any ways...

Thanks,


On 5/15/05, Javier-Elias Vasquez-Vivas <jevv.cr@gmail.com> wrote:
> Very interesting and helpful.  1st thing is to say it works for my
> dell inspiron 600m.  So this is a good work around...  So thanks for
> the tip...
>=20
> 2nd thing, just to clarify, the option reverts the touchpad detection.
>  Instead of detecting the toucpad as "ALPS Touchpad on isa0060/serio1"
> by default under 2.6.11.8, now it does it as it did under 2.6.10,
> "PS/2 Generic Mouse on isa0060/serio1".  I have no problems with this,
> since it's the way it was working under 2.6.10, and I was used to
> it...
>=20
> 3rd thing, I'm implying from your reply that for some reason under
> kernel 2.6.11 the touchpad detection lets say improved/changed from
> just generic PS/2 device to touchpad.  However 2.6.11 kernel support
> for the detected touchpad is not working yet, so it's disabled, and
> the software driver must be used.  Why releasing unsupported kernel
> drivers then (very interesting, it sounds like the release shoud have
> been delayed until having the support)?  This also means as soon as
> 2.6.12 is realesed it must be tried so that touchpad detection and its
> support is tried (that's the new/improved way of the kernel to deal
> with the touchpad any ways), in case it comes out clean or not...  I
> also imply all later versions of 2.6.11 won't solve this, only kernel
> supporting touchpad or at least this one will be 2.6.12 and beyond?...
>   Are my implied suppositions OK?  We must see also the change_log's.
> As stated in my 1st mail, I looked into 2.6.9 change_log, and it
> doesn't say anything about mouse/touchpad drivers and the like, but I
> looked into the 2.6.12-rc4 change_log, and it doesn't include anything
> either, maybe the touchpad support will come later, after several
> pre-releases...
>=20
> Thanks a lot,
>=20
> Javier.
>=20
>=20
> On 5/15/05, A. C. Censi <accensi@gmail.com> wrote: 
<jevv.cr@gmail.com> wrote:[vbcol=seagreen] 
er[vbcol=seagreen] 
you[vbcol=seagreen] 
s[vbcol=seagreen] 
bian.org[vbcol=seagreen] 
>=20


--=20
Javier-Elias Vasquez-Vivas

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On 5/15/05, Javier-Elias Vasquez-Vivas <jevv.cr@gmail.com> wrote:
>=20 
> --

In kernel 2.6.11 detection of the Alps touchpad is already correct,
only the initialization of the driver is disabling the double tap
hardware detection, as you can see literally in the dmesg, Alps
touchpad detected and double tap hardware detection disabled. In
kernel 2.6.12 it is supposed to change this double tap hardfware
detection disabling, as software double tap handling is not reliable
(at least this was the tone in several mail exchange in kernel lists
some weeks ago when I was searching about the problem - see more
below.

Some people managed the Synaptics driver in XFree86/Xorg, using
information available in synaptics driver home page (already
referenced in this thread) and in a specific Alps readme file  in the
driver package. By changing the config values using a command line
utility, synclient, if I remember well, you can make double tap to
work. The big difference of using the 2.6.11 alps/synaptics driver is
that you can have some advanced gestures like scrolling
vertically/horizontally by sliding the finger in the right/lower edge,
tapping with 2 or 3 fingers simultaneosly and getting the touchpad
detect this as 2 or 3 mouse button press, etc. By chnaging the timings
I sometimes can get a double tap detected even in 2.6.11.

Also in the driver there is another utility to disable touchpad when
you start typing for avoiding change of cursor position.

Finally, a quick search on kernel list showed this:

http://seclists.org/lists/linux-ker...5/Mar/2703.html

Hi Linus!

Now that 2.6.11 was released, I've got these nice 128 patches pending
for 2.6.12.

They include many fixes, several new drivers (mainly for touchscreens,
and less common architecture keyboards), refactoring of gameport
core to fix possible races, race fixes in serio.

The patches all have been in -mm for a while, some longer, some shorter,
and got testing in the SuSE kernel as well. I'm pretty confident they
fix a lot, and don't break much.
....
ChangeSet@1.1982.22.108, 2005-02-04 20:04:21+01:00, petero2@telia.com
input: When hardware tapping is disabled on an ALPS touchpad, the touchpa=
d
generates exactly the same data for a single tap and a fast double
tap. The effect is that the second tap in the double tap sequence is
lost.
=20
To fix this problem, this patch enables hardware tapping and converts
the resulting tap and gesture bits to standard finger pressure values
(z), which is what mousedev.c and the userspace X driver expects.
=20
Signed-off-by: Peter Osterlund <petero2@telia.com>
Signed-off-by: Vojtech Pavlik <vojtech@suse.cz>
....

I hope it was accepted.

Sorry for the long post.

--=20
A. C. Censi
accensi [em] gmail [ponto] com
accensi [em] montreal [ponto] com [ponto] br

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>Now that 2.6.11 was released, I've got >these nice 128 patches pending
>for 2.6.12.
>They include many fixes, several new >drivers (mainly for touchscreens,
>and less common architecture keyboards), >refactoring of gameport
>core to fix possible races, race fixes in >serio.

I hope this will solve the problem with also my touchpad (CA6700 laptop).

Under 2.6.9. padding works great.
Under 2.6.11-1.27 it does NOT work at all.
I do NOT have any info in dmesg about touchpad either (is it recognized by t
he kernel?)
But the worst thing is when i run firefox and choose any URL, that URL is lo
aded but in a moment when i move the mouse pointer (with touchpad) (sometime
s  i dont even need to move it), firefox picks up a random?? URL from the lo
aded WWW page and tries to load it?! (as if the touchpad automatically and "
silently" did a click at one of those URLs). This is very annoying and i nee
d to press 'Go Back' to return to the original page.
I hope this will be fixed in future kernels.

Thanks for your time.
Greetings,
Grzegorz

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quote:
Originally posted by Grzegorz 
I do NOT have any info in dmesg about touchpad either (is it recognized by t
he kernel?)
 

Sorry for a little misinformation.
Actually there is an info about ALPS:
>ALPS Touchpad (Glidepoint) detected
>  Disabling hardware tapping
>input: AlpsPS/2 ALPS TouchPad on >isa0060/serio1

So it is the same case as yours.
Greetings,
Grzegorz

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I have a 500m.  I have been trying to solve this for years and it finally oc
curred to me to go to dell and look for a newer driver for the touchpad.  Tu
rns out the new Alps driver is very flexible and its easy to turn off the ta
pping or individual buttons or what have you.

After it installs go to control panel -> mouse.

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