Debian KDE Setup - Mouse Problems
 

After many days of trying to do an INTERNET install of Debian Linux I finally have it setup with a KDE desktop but my mouse fails to work. I have a simple Microsoft PS2 Optical mouse. How can I get this mouse working? I almost gave up and went to Ubuntu which is easy to setup but I wanted to try Debian since I've heard so much about it. I wanted the Gnome desktop but could not get it working so I switched to KDE and it works or almost works Any help would be appreciated for this old man.

Thanks

Hi,

Did you try to do this in a terminal(as root):
Try to post the pointer section of your xfree/xorg conf. file here.

Debian KDE Setup - Mouse Problems
 

I'm a newbie and I don't have a clue as to what you are talking about when it comes to mouseconfig.

Ok,

I assume you have installed Debian, and that you are able to boot it up and login.

Now.

Open a terminal (command line)

Type this:
It responds:
Password: typeinyourROOTpasswordhere

Now type:

Debian KDE Setup - Mouse Problems
 

Yes, I can boot into the desktop but my mouse cursor is frozen. How do I open a command window without the use of the mouse. I have tried the tab and arrow keys but they don't help much.

I have also managed to get my optical mouse lit up but it still doesn't work.

Press ctrl+alt+F2

This will open a full terminal window. Log in as root, run mouseconfig and reboot.

After using the command su and password I typed in mouseconfig and this is what it says "bash: mouseconfig not found"

No wonder I do not believe such a thing exists in Debian try using the command given above to get to the console logging in as root dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86 choose the advanced option now while doing this you may as well look in the book for your monitor or Google search on the model number/make and have your proper refresh rates handy because Debian always sets them too low. When you get to the mouse part say yes to the emulate 3 buttons choose /dev/psaux for the port connection. Now if using the KDE display manager use /etc/init.d/kdm restart if using Gnome display manager use gdm in the line.

Stephen I learned a Little more about commands following your instructions but when I try to enter"/etc/init.d/kdm restart" nothing happens. I'm at a lose with this Debian OS and almost ready to try something else. Can't understand why it has to be this hard to get setup and going.

It looks like kdm is not installed then you could have used either gdm or xdm in the line to restart the X server depending on which it is that was installed. It is usually not that hard to configure a mouse sometimes the auto-detect gets it wrong though, oh I forgot to add you should have chosen either the PS/2 or IMPS/2 (for wheel mouse) for the protocol when you reconfigured.

Stephen,
Guess what, I yanked the PS2 mouse and plug in a USB mouse and everything started working like a charm. I have a KDE desktop and I still can figure out why I could not get that PS2 mouse working. I really feels good to get this thing going after several days of working on it and trying various things that you all have told me to try. This has been a great learning experience for me and I needed that since I am not that familiar with Linux commands. I learn better by doing and I want to thank all of you wonderful people for helping me.

Les Byers