Ubuntu – X11 ignoring options in configuration for input device

touchpadxorg

I have reinstalled my system, a Samsung Series 9 laptop with a clickpad, under Ubuntu 12.04. I reinstalled it a few times and re-configured it with the same OS because I had issues with the filesystem getting corrupted (ext4 on this SSD with this kernel isn't so great apparently).

Anyway, I re-installed it for a Nth time and configured the ClickPad the same way as before:

/usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/52-clickpad.conf

Section "InputClass"
        Identifier      "np900x3b clickpad"
        MatchIsTouchpad "on"
        MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*"
        Option          "ClickPad"      "1"
        Option          "ClickFinger1"  "1"
        Option          "ClickFinger2"  "3"
        Option          "ClickFinger3"  "2"
        Option          "FastTaps"      "1"
        Option          "RightButtonAreaLeft"   "2000"
        Option          "RightButtonAreaTop"    "1500"
EndSection

I had the same configuration before (I actually copied it from a USB drive), and it worked fine. Yet I get this after restarting X:

$ synclient -l | grep -i "\(right\|click\|fast\)"
    RightEdge               = 2974
    ClickTime               = 100
    FastTaps                = 1
    ClickFinger1            = 1
    ClickFinger2            = 3
    ClickFinger3            = 2
    AreaRightEdge           = 0
    ClickPad                = 1
    RightButtonAreaLeft     = 0
    RightButtonAreaRight    = 0
    RightButtonAreaTop      = 0
    RightButtonAreaBottom   = 0
    MiddleButtonAreaRight   = 0

It appears that all options are being handled properly, except the RightButtonArea[...] ones. Looking at X logs gives me no clue about the problem, with no errors, only this:

[  1499.416] (--) synaptics: ETPS/2 Elantech Touchpad: Vendor 0x2 Product 0xe
[  1499.416] (**) Option "ClickPad" "1"
[  1499.416] (**) Option "FastTaps" "1"
[  1499.416] (**) Option "ClickFinger1" "1"
[  1499.416] (**) Option "ClickFinger2" "3"
[  1499.416] (**) Option "ClickFinger3" "2"
[  1499.416] (--) synaptics: ETPS/2 Elantech Touchpad: touchpad found

If I set them manually using synclient:

synclient RightButtonAreaLeft=2000

…then it works, but obviously I have to set manually them every time I start X.

Note that RightButtonAreaLeft depends on ClickPad=1 to work, although it is set correctly.

So it seems that the RightButtonArea[...] options are simply ignored by X. Like I said, I just reinstalled the system a few times before and it worked perfectly fine on every occasion.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Best Answer

As a temporary workaround, I've found this.

I've created a script, /usr/share/X11/startup.sh:

#!/bin/bash

synclient RightButtonAreaLeft=2000
synclient RightButtonAreaTop=1500

...and modified /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf accordingly:

[SeatDefaults]
# ...
session-setup-script=/usr/share/X11/startup.sh

Seems to do the trick for now. I would still like to know if there's any way to fix this behavior in X.

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