Sid’s Blog

So, after much ado, I have been able to fix the tapping issue on my EeePC 901 running Eeebuntu NBR 2.0.

To be honest, the solution was all over the forums, but none of the posts specifically mentioned the 901. I spent a few hours trying different things and eventually got the settings about where I want them. The trick was that all the steps in this post need to be followed. The post indicates that this works for the 900 as well, but YMMV.

The trackpad seems responsive, yet not overly so,  it’s not jumpy (as it was with just the elantech driver), and I even have both vertical scrolling on the side of the trackpad and two finger scrolling as well.

Here’s the steps that I performed (these are pretty much identical to the post, but I’ve added some dialog):

The first step is to enable the driver module in the kernel. To do this create a file in /etc/modprobe.d called eeepc and enter the following line in the file:

options psmouse elantech=1

I rebooted for the module to load. I noticed upon rebooting that the mouse was very jittery and it was hard to make small moves.

Next I created a file named shmconfig.fdi in /etc/hal/fdi/policy and entered in the following text:

<?xml version=”1.0″ encoding=”ISO-8859-1″?>
<deviceinfo version=”0.2″>
<device>
<match key=”info.product” string=”ETPS/2 Elantech Touchpad”>
<merge key=”input.x11_options.SHMConfig” type=”string”>True</merge>
<merge key=”input.x11_driver” type=”string”>synaptics</merge>
</match>
</device>
<device>
<match key=”info.linux.driver” string=”psmouse”>
<merge key=”input.x11_options.SHMConfig” type=”string”>True</merge>
</match>
</device>
</deviceinfo>

I rebooted again to load the driver in gnome. The trackpad was still jittery, but I was now able to adjust sensitivity in Prefereneces -> Mouse. I also noticed that I had lost two finger scrolling at this point.

Now, to fix the tap while typing problem you have to run the following command (which will run as a deamon):

syndaemon -i 0.7 -d -t -K

Now the tapping while typing problem is no more. To run this command on gnome startup you can put it in the session manager by running gnome-session-properties from the command line and entering the following:

Name: Synadaemon
Command: syndaemon -i 0.7 -d -t -K
Comment: Disables touchpad 0.7 second while typing

As such:

[View with PicLens]

Now that I had the typing and tapping issue solved, I wanted to get the two finger controls back. To do this you need to install the installed gsynaptics-elantech package through apt-get or synaptic. Once installed two finger scrolling works and there is a new application in Preferences with which you can configure the touchpad to your specifications.

Happy typing with no tapping

Sid Boswell Blog, Linux, Work Eeebuntu, EeePC, Hardware, Linux