Ubuntu – How to assign “back” and “forward” actions to Logitech Anywhere Mouse MX’ horizontal scroll wheel

logitechmousemouse-wheel

I am using a Logitech Anywhere Mouse MX on my Ubuntu. Mouse works well, but I can't assign the actions to the extra buttons available on it. What I miss the most is the "back" and "forward" actions assigned to the scroll wheel tilt left and right.

How can I activate these features?

Best Answer

I have this same mouse, and I wanted to bind the two buttons on the side of the mouse to forward and back. Here is how I solved this:

1) Use the utility "xev" to determine what numbers the buttons you are wanting to remap correspond to. You may have to install this package using

sudo apt-get install xev

Once xev is installed type "xev" into a terminal, and an X window that is white with a black box will pop up. Moving your mouse into that window will begin registering events to the terminal. Reading the output of that carefully will tell you the numbers of your mouse buttons. On my mouse, the left and right tilt map to buttons 6 and 7 respectively.

2) Now we are going to use the utility "xbindkeys" to remap the mouse buttons to key presses. If you don't already have this installed you may have to install it with

sudo apt-get install xbindkeys

3) Create a file in your home directory called ".xbindkeysrc". This is what xbindkeys will read to see what you are remapping. The contents of my .xbindkeysrc file are:

 "/usr/bin/xvkbd -xsendevent -text "\[Alt_L]\[Left]""
   m:0x0 + b:8

 "/usr/bin/xvkbd -xsendevent -text "\[Alt_L]\[Right]""
  m:0x0 + b:9

So this tells my computer to send the keyboard button presses "Alt+Left" or "Alt+Right" to the system using the virtual keyboard (xvkbd) whenever button 8 on mouse 0 is pressed or button 9 on mouse 0 is pressed respectively. These keys correspond to the the forward and back keys in most applications. This will work, for example, in Nautilus, chrome/

Note: you may need to install xvkbd if not already present on your system. sudo apt-get install xvkbd

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to assign actions to all the mouse buttons

If all buttons are detected correctly then you can install btnx:

sudo apt-get install btnx OR sudo aptitude install btnx

Then go to: Applications -> System Tools -> Btnx

It has support for many types of mice

Ubuntu – binding back/forward to mouse buttons

Install the package xautomation, we need the command xte
```
sudo apt-get install xautomation
```
Install the package x11-utils, we need the command xev
```
sudo apt-get install x11-utils
```

Check the code for the two mouse buttons.

Start the command xev in a terminal:
```
xev
```
Move the mouse in the new window
Press your wheel left and wheel right

In my case, note the output button 6 and button 7:

ButtonRelease event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x2e00001,
    root 0x233, subw 0x0, time 9222464, (94,21), root:(1774,85),
    state 0x10, button 6, same_screen YES

ButtonPress event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x2e00001,
    root 0x233, subw 0x0, time 9223854, (94,21), root:(1774,85),
    state 0x10, button 7, same_screen YES

Edit your xbindkeys configuration, e.g.:

nano ~/.xbindkeysrc

and add the lines below

"xte 'keydown Alt_L' 'keydown Left' 'keyup Left' 'keyup Alt_L'"
     b:6

"xte 'keydown Alt_L' 'keydown Right' 'keyup Right' 'keyup Alt_L'"
     b:7

Replace b:6 and b:7 with your numbers of xev output

from man xte

key k
      Press and release key k

keydown  k
      Press key k down

keyup k
      Release key k

Kill all kbindkeys processes
```
killall xbindkeys
```
Restart xbindkeys with your configuration, eg:
```
xbindkeys -f ~/.xbindkeysrc
```

Best Answer

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