Multi-touch became trendy after iphone came up with it. We are seeing many new laptops with multi-touch. At hardware level, there is nothing special that you need, to make multi-touch work. You can also do two-finger scroll and two-finger tap to right/middle click. Also, three-finger tap, but, for me it is very hard to press three fingers at the same time(1 out of 10).
Create new file
gksudo gedit /etc/hal/fdi/policy/11-x11-synaptics.fdiPaste the following code into the file and save it.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<deviceinfo version="0.2">
<device>
<match key="info.capabilities" contains="input.touchpad">
<merge key="input.x11_driver" type="string">synaptics</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.SHMConfig" type="string">On</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.EmulateTwoFingerMinZ" type="string">90</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.VertTwoFingerScroll" type="string">1</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.HorizTwoFingerScroll" type="string">1</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.TapButton1" type="string">1</merge>
<merge key="input.x11_options.TapButton2" type="string">3</merge> <!--two finger tap -> middle clieck(3) -->
<merge key="input.x11_options.TapButton3" type="string">2</merge> <!--three finger tap -> right click(2). almost impossible to click -->
</match>
</device>
</deviceinfo>
Restart hal and enjoy multitouch touchpad.
sudo /etc/init.d/hal restart
Update: Diagnosing your touchpad for multi-finger-sensing-capability
Few people have problem with this not working, while it works for few others. This is posted in ubuntu forumssynclient -m 100Fifth column in the output f is number of fingers on your touchpad. Put two or more fingers on your touchpad and watch the column. If you see it more than one, this should work for you.
34 comments:
Awesome tip, thanks!
This is not multitouch. You cannot do pinching, expanding or rotating.
This is not working for me. I'm using a Sony VAIO SZ with Ubuntu 7.10. Are you sure that its hardware independent?
How about the vertical middle-finger scroll? Touch to grab is an extreme annoyance. Makes negotiating menu's damn near impossible. How well does your mouse work when you never know for sure if or when the left mouse button is going to auto-activate?
How about sensible touch-pad software where the user can turn-off tapping and use the touch-pad the way it was designed for, moving the pointer!
To poe9514, upgrade to 8.10, and make sure you have a Synaptics Touchpad.
To Anonoymos No. 2. click on [system]>[Prefrences>[Touchpad]>[Tapping] and uncheck (untick) the taping enable box. Then the tapping part will be turned off.
Works perfectly on my laptop.
ThanksThanksThanks.
Worked just right! Thank you very very much!~
Any links on how to add new gestures?
Wow this is excellent, thanks. It works like a charm.
This doesn't even work. You are all crazy.
Hi Ravi,
Just curious about the dis/advantages, of making /etc/hal/fdi/policy/11-x11-synaptics.fdi versus editing /etc/X11/xorg.conf
On my installation of Ubuntu 8.04 (running on a Compaq Evo N800C, with a Synaptics 5.9 Touchpad) I've enabled two finger scrolling and more via the following edits to /etc/X11/xorg.conf:
insertions to Section "InputDevice"
Option "HorizEdgeScroll" "0"
Option "VertEdgeScroll" "0"
Option "SHMConfig" "on"
Option "VertTwoFingerScroll" "1"
Option "HorizTwoFingerScroll" "1"
Option "TapButton2" "3"
Thanks,
Bhaskar
This doesn't work for me on a Dell Inspiron 8600. I remember following these directions, though, to get the graphical configuration working: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SynapticsTouchpad#shmconfig
So I have more files in there:
/e/h/f/policy> ls
11-x11-synaptics.fdi 20-ntfs-config-read-policy.fdi@ preferences.fdi shmconfig.fdi
Maybe there's a conflict?
so happy to have this working.
Scroll works but right click double tap does not. I still have the button for that which is actually better.
Thanks for the tip.
Two finger scroll works, however, single finger navigation is not so smooth any more.
I think I'll turn this feature off, since I could always use the right edge of the pad to do scroll.
Thanks anyway pal!
Or we could try NOT emulating inferior crap like iPhones.
I am using them and now i want to disable the options..how do i that
thanks
please, how to revert this?? I'm a newbie. My pad is behaving in a strange way and I don't want this.
If you want to remove this feature after you installed it you have to delete the file you created in step one using this command:
sudo rm /etc/hal/fdi/policy/11-x11-synaptics.fdi
Then type:
sudo /etc/init.d/hal restart
If you want to remove this feature after you installed it you have to delete the file you created in step one using this command:
sudo rm /etc/hal/fdi/policy/11-x11-synaptics.fdi
Then type:
sudo /etc/init.d/hal restart
@poe9514 It doesn't work on my Vaio PCG-TR3A (running Ubuntu 8.10). Maybe a Vaio thing?
This works fine on a Synaptics Touchpad 6.7 under Intrepid...but on an Acer 10" netbook, AOD150, Touchpad 7.2, Jaunty, the "f" column sometimes gets stuck on 4 or 5 when synclient is run; also, pointer location and clicks are erratic.
With the 6.7 touchpad, I also couldn't get the right-click functionality; I'm not sure why.
WOW, this is so awesome, does someone have an idea how to enable multitouch support for windows? I know I shouldn't ask for it but i need windows for my work and I really enjoy this feature and I can't live without it. This Would make coding on the go much easier!
I'd like to note not all synaptics touchpads actually support detection of multiple fingers (eg: some HP DV4/5/6/7's) - and as such this won't work for those laptops.
I'm a bit confused as to why this isn't working for me. I've got an asus and multitouch works under windows (well, pinch and stretch to zoom in and out at least, not two finger scroll).
When I run synclient I only ever get it detecting one finger :(
Not working for me on Asus 1005HA (-M matte screen), Synaptics fw 7.2 is detected in the log.
On Ubuntu 9.05 UNE
synclient always reports 1 finger
just ran across this and tried it, didn't work and so i ran the diagnostic and found that Dell Mini 10v doesn't seem to support multitouch. just an FYI for anyone else in the future looking to do this (i saw it as a possible solution to the terrible terrible touchpad buttons)
If you want to use 2 finger scroll for windows, go to asus website and get the synaptics driver for 1008HA (ver. 13). It worked for me, and I have a 1005HA-PU.
I'm using Jaunty as well and synclient doesn't seem to regconize multi touch, so i haven't dared to proceed with the instructions yet ..... it's really nice to have 2 finger scrolling thou...
This worked on my HP Pavillion dv 6448se
Here is some information which applies to Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala at least.
Please see:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-input-synaptics/+bug/355071
and (tells how to set-up synaptics to support multi-touch emulation if hw support is not present):
http://blog.twinapex.fi/2009/10/11/setting-up-multi-touch-scrolling-for-ubuntu-9-10-karmic-koala-linux-on-asus-eee-1005ha-netbook/
works fine on hp dv9610us with ubuntu jaunty 9.04
Excellent! Just installed Jaunty recently to play around with, and was bummed when finding I couldn't middle click with the touchpad. This worked perfectly 'straight-out-of-the-box', no settings to change, it just works! Thanks!!
ccv?
worked on fresh kubuntu karmic install. tks!
Use synclient to set the buttons tap in Ubuntu 9.10 on EeePC 1008HA. Middle button is button 2 on this hardware, 3 is right click (different than above).
Setting synclient TapButton2=2 works great. I added that to a script to run every time I log in.
Hope it helps.
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