ok i use a logitech trackman (USB IR trackball) and i really like it compaired to a standard mouse.

RH9, MDK10, FC1, and now WhiteBox 3 will use the trackball during their install, but refuse to use it once the system is up and running...

WTF is up with this, and is there anything i can do to get it working properly?

i really really want to be able to use my trackball, but if it will work, and test properly during the GUI install, why will it not work once gnome is up and running or KDE for that matter.

now i do have to say that SuSe 9.1 personal did work both in the install and in the OS once it was up, but it is not a distro i was able to like and deleted it from my system.

thank you.

lleb_kcir; have u checked the HCL for compatibilty. some devices supported some not.

I have my Logitech USB trackball working on Red Hat Workstation. It's configured as a Generic 3 Button USB though. Haven't had any trouble at all out of it. The scroll wheel even works

penguin4, my point was it worked during the GUI install, but once i got into gnome it no longer worked,

MiscGeek, ill keep working on it. doyou have USB1 or USB2 on your workstation? im running USB2 on my MB, dont know if that makes a differance.

leb_kcir, it's running USB2 so that shouldn't be it. Below is the InputDevice section from my XF86Config, in case it's any help.

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "IMPS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
EndSection

would be if A. i knew what that was B. i knew why on the next install of the exact same OS/distro on the exact same hardware my trackball all of the sudden works but my NICs dont.

im in the proccess of getting help from LQ about the NICs in an other thread.

thanks for the input and help though.

I'm using a Logitech Trackman Cordless FX with Mandrake Linux 10.1 (cooker).

X Protocol Version 11, Revision 0, Release 6.7 (xorg)

I tinkered around with this and roamed the Web for answers on how to make this thing work, and work like I wanted it to work, and as I think it should work.



The buttons are working as following:

Button3 - Button1 - Button4 (Emulating the wheel) - Ball - Button2

For this I'm using the following configuration in xorg.conf:

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "ExplorerPS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mouse0"
Option "Vendor" "AutoDetected"
Option "Buttons" "4"
# Enable wheel emulation
Option "EmulateWheel" "1"
# Define what button makes the wheel work
Option "EmulateWheelButton" "4"
# Works well with every application, sends button 4 and 5 events, which "4 5" wouldn't
# You can test both configurations with 'xev' :-)
Option "ZAxisMapping" "5 6"
# Change the direction of the movement
Option "AngleOffset" "10"
# Turn off 3 button emulation, we have already 3 buttons
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "0"
# Controls the movement of the wheel, I'm still trying to understand what is the best value
Option "EmulateWheelInertia" "65"
EndSection


This doesn't give horizontal scrolling, I can try to add it if it is needed, I belive it should be easy to do, the "4 5 6 7" solution doesn't work well, maybe a "5 6 7 8"? I'll try it later.

When using the "wheel" the application under the pointer will get the focus like it used to with the normal wheel mouse, and it even works where sometimes the wheel of my Logitech Optical Double Sensor wouldn't, when the pointer was above an Ad, flash animation or something of that kind, I couldn't scroll more, with this it works everywhere. Perfect!

I tweaked the KDE mouse configuration a bit, and I'm feeling confortable with it right now:

Mouse acceleration: 1.5x
Pointer threshold: 4 pixels

Feels right.


Good luck to you all. I love my trackball!