Re the mouse pad, install
ksynaptics. It handles Synaptics and Alps touchpads. It installs a applet icon when you run it that’s saved with the session so you only need to run it once.
Oh, most touchpads are Synaptics or Alps. You should see something like this:
Code:
$ dmesg | grep pad
Synaptics Touchpad, model: 1, fw: 5.9, id: 0x23aeb3, caps: 0xa04713/0x10008
, although that’s
after the driver’s been loaded.