Ubuntu 14.04 – Fixing Left Mouse Button Acting Like Right

14.04lenovomouse

After some recent updates (beginning of last week or so) two problem appeared. I try to find solution or determine if i should rapport it as a bug. I'am by no means Linux expert, so any help with determining what we have here will be appreciated:

System

Lenovo T420
Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS

Problem

Sometimes (I cannot find any pattern) left mouse button starts acting like right is supposed to, and right mouse button don't work at all.
Sometimes (again, I cannot find any pattern) cursor is moving slowly without my input mostly to the upper-right corner of the screen, but not always.
Both problems appeared when i was using generic USB mouse, but persists even when I am using only touch-pad or Logitech M185 Wireless mouse.

Workaround

Switching to another terminal (ALT+CTRL+FX) and going back to regular session (ALT+CTRL+F7) seems to fix problem for a seemingly random amount of time.

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Solution

Edit: Updated, as I incorrectly assumed that psmouse kernel module provides support for legacy mouses. In fact, this is touchpad support. Currently, i'am testing if update to 14.10 fixes problem with this module to get touchpad to work also ( i didn't noticed that it was not working earlier)

It appears that kernel module psmouse providing touchpad support was interfering with mouse for unidentified reason.

Unload module to restore normal mouse behavior:

gniewomir@gniewomir-ThinkPad-T420:~$ sudo modprobe -r psmouse

Prevent module from loading:

gniewomir@gniewomir-ThinkPad-T420:~$ sudo vim /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

Add line:

blacklist psmouse

Then:

gniewomir@gniewomir-ThinkPad-T420:~$ sudo update-initramfs -u

Reboot and we are done.

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – Strange mouse click behaviour after reinstalling Ubuntu 14.04.1

It seems the mouse issue was caused by some configuration files (I reinstalled Ubuntu 14.04.1, but my home directory pointed to a separated home partition that was not formatted when reinstalling Ubuntu).

So I backed up all of the hidden files and hidden directories in the my home directory using tar -czf cfg.backup.tar.gz ~/.*, then I removed all the hidden files and hidden directories in the my home directory by sudo rm -rf ~/.*.

I restarted the computer, after I logged in, everything is ok! now, if you miss some custom configuration you has lost, you can find it from cfg.backup.tar.gz, use the one in the backup to replace the one in your home directory.

Editor's Note:

WARNING! while removing offending config files is a useful technique, removing all hidden files and directories is not a good idea as many things will not work properly. A better approach might be to back up all your config files and try renaming or removing the likely suspects one by one (start with ~/.config and if that doesn't work try ~/.local). If you really feel you need to nuke the whole lot (highly unlikely) then you could make a new user, and copy the hidden files from the new user's home directory over those in your old home directory, for example.

Fix Left Mouse Button Randomly Stopping

I have exactly the same problem on a Sony Vaio with Xubuntu 16.04, but the left mouse button stops working about every third hour, both on the touchpad and on the external mouse. To date I have been logging out and in again to fix it. Recently I found this alternative.

sudo modprobe -r psmouse
sudo modprobe psmouse proto=imps

Works fine for the external mouse, but the touchpad gets slow and stops scrolling. However, after entering the commands the hanging never bothers me, not even after a full workday.

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Ubuntu – Strange mouse click behaviour after reinstalling Ubuntu 14.04.1

Fix Left Mouse Button Randomly Stopping

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