Ubuntu – Disabling One-Finger Tap-to-Click But Keep Two-Finger tap Ubuntu 12.04

To fix the middle click you can use the following command:

xinput set-int-prop NN 266 8 2 3 0 0 1 2 3

Where NN is the id of the mousepad device, you can see it with the command xinput list. 266 is the id of the property "Synaptics Tap Action" you can see it with xinput list-props NN

You have to run this command every time you boot/login/wake.

To make it permanent you can put this command to the end of your .profile file in your home folder. (You can also try to put it in /etc/init.d/rc.local, but in my case it didn't work.)

To get your synclient settings to stick you can add them to xorg.conf. I did this recently for my macbook pro in 12.10 and it works pretty well.

You can also specify a separate configuration file in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ file to keep things neater. Here's a step by step:

1. Create /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d (if it doesn't already exist)

   sudo mkdir /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d

2. Create and edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-synaptics.conf

   gksudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-synaptics.conf

3. Make it look like the following:

   #Sample /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-synaptics.conf
   Section "InputClass"
     Identifier "touchpad catchall"
     Driver "synaptics"
     MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*"
     MatchIsTouchpad "true"
     Option  "SHMConfig"           "true"
     Option  "TapButton1"          "1"
     Option  "TapButton2"          "2"
     Option  "TapButton3"          "3"
   EndSection
   

4. Save and logout/login again. If the xserver fails to load and you get forced into low graphics mode then edit the file again and comment everything out, or mv /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-synaptics.conf ~/10-synaptics.conf.backup and reload again to get back to normal.

For posterity, my current setup for my macbook pro 2012 13" is as follows (warning, I like my touchpad rather sensitive). Try any of these options using synclient before putting them into xorg.conf!

Section "InputClass"
      Identifier "touchpad catchall"
      Driver "synaptics"
      MatchIsTouchpad "on"
      MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*"
      MatchProduct "bcm5974"
      MatchIsTouchpad "true"
      Option  "SHMConfig"           "true"
      Option  "FastTaps"            "1"
      Option  "MaxDoubleTapTime"    "100"
      Option  "BottomEdge"          "6000"
      Option  "FingerLow"           "60"
      Option  "FingerHigh"          "90"
      Option         "ClickFinger3" "2"
#      Option         "FingerLow"             "30"
#      Option         "FingerHigh"            "80"
      Option         "VertTwoFingerScroll" "1"
      Option         "HorizTwoFingerScroll" "1"
      Option         "VertScrollDelta" "100"
      Option         "HorizScrollDelta" "100"
      Option         "MultiFingerButton" "2"
      #Option         "TapButton1" "1"
      Option         "TapButton2" "3"
      Option         "TapButton3" "2"
      Option         "MinSpeed" "1"
      Option         "MaxSpeed" "2"
      Option         "AccelFactor" "0.01"
#      Option         "AreaBottomEdge" "5000"
EndSection