Ubuntu – How to disable touchpad while typing in ubuntu 14.04

14.04system-settingstouchpadubuntu-gnome

I want the touchpad to get disabled while typing.

Opening the system configuration and selecting "Pointing Devices" I can change only very basic settings, namely the primary and secondary button assignment, double click speed and cursor movement speed.

So, let's google…

I have found this. Further details about reasons or possible fixes are missing.

Some work-arounnds that I have found doesn't work for me. My system doesn't seem to load synaptics driver:

If type synclient I get Couldn't find synaptics properties. No synaptics driver loaded?.

I have also installed synaptiks, but at run it says that it can't find any touchpad.

Nevertheless, the basic functions of the touchpad work.

I don't know if this is relevant: my notebook is an Acer Aspire E 15 ES1-511-C18C and the Ubuntu version is, as I have said in the title, 14.04.
If I run the app "Mouse and Touchpad", I can see that the device detected is "PS/2 Elantech Touchpad".

ajh@ANTONIO-ACER:~$ syndaemon 
ajh@ANTONIO-ACER:~$ killall syndaemon
syndaemon: proceso no encontrado
ajh@ANTONIO-ACER:~$ syndaemon -i 1 -K d
ajh@ANTONIO-ACER:~$ killall syndaemon
syndaemon: proceso no encontrado
ajh@ANTONIO-ACER:~$ syndaemon -i 1 -K -d
ajh@ANTONIO-ACER:~$ killall syndaemon
syndaemon: proceso no encontrado

(Note: "Proceso no encontrado" is "process not found" in Spanish).

Best Answer

First entirely undo the current setting: Remove the tick for Disable touchpad while typing in Mouse & Touchpad settings.

Now search for and open Startup Applications from the Dash. Click Add.

Name: Syndaemon

Command: syndaemon -i 1.0 -K -R -t

Comment: Disable touchpad while typing, with a reasonable delay and only for tapping and scrolling

The -i 1.0 parameter sets the idle time of the keyboard to 1s. -K option ignores the Modifier keys. -R option uses the XRecord extension for detecting keyboard activity instead of polling the keyboard state. -t option disables tapping and scrolling but not mouse movements.

Click Add and then Close.

Reboot your computer.

Note: this is a user preference, so repeat this in every user account.

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Ubuntu – Help trying to get two-finger scrolling to work on Asus UL80VT

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:

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

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

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

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

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

Ubuntu – psmouse serio1: alps: Unknown ALPS touchpad in a Lenovo Ideapad Flex 15

Your problem seems to be due to incomplete support for the newer ALPS v7 touchpads used in the Lenovo Flex series. A patch for the psmouse driver was created recently (http://www.spinics.net/lists/linux-input/msg29084.html), and here you can find a DKMS-version of the updated driver: https://github.com/he1per/psmouse-dkms-alpsv7

Try the following, in a terminal:

cd /tmp
git clone http://github.com/he1per/psmouse-dkms-alpsv7
cd psmouse-dkms-alpsv7
gedit install.sh &

Then replace the first line of the file install.sh by:

#!/bin/bash

And the modules directory location:

MDIR="/lib/modules/$(uname -r)"

because the modules are stored in /lib and not in /usr/lib in ubuntu

and save the file. Finally, run:

sudo ./install.sh

You'll get an error, but the driver does seem to get installed. After a reboot, dmesg reported:

input: AlpsPS/2 ALPS GlidePoint as /devices/platform/i8042/serio1/input/input7

and the touchpad on my Flex 14 worked as expected.

Best Answer

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Ubuntu – Help trying to get two-finger scrolling to work on Asus UL80VT

Ubuntu – psmouse serio1: alps: Unknown ALPS touchpad in a Lenovo Ideapad Flex 15

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