Configure wheel button to do different things

cwwilson721 · 03-06-2006, 02:45 AM

I'm using a USB optical mouse. The scroll function works fine. I was just wondering if there was any way to make the "wheel button" be configured as anything else? (Example: double left click)

Running 10.2, kernel 2.6.15, KDE
Relevent output from cat /proc/bus/input/devices:

Code:

I: Bus=0003 Vendor=04b4 Product=6370 Version=0001
N: Name="Acrox         Acrox RF Ball Mouse"
P: Phys=usb-0000:00:1d.0-1/input0
S: Sysfs=/class/input/input1
H: Handlers=mouse0 event1
B: EV=7
B: KEY=1f0000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
B: REL=103

Relevent xorg.conf excerpt:

Code:

Section "Input Device"
  Driver          "mouse"
  Identifier      "Mouse1"
  Option          "Device"              "/dev/mouse"
  Option          "Buttons"             "5"
  Option          "ZAxisMapping"        "4 5"
  Option          "Protocol"            "Auto"
EndSection

Basically, I just wish to change the function of the "Scroll Button" to be something other than the standard 3rd button. A program or a change to the xorg.conf maybe?

Any ideas would be appreciated.

gbonvehi · 03-06-2006, 03:27 AM

You can use xmodmap (man xmodmap) to change the number assigned to each button or use imwheel (http://imwheel.sourceforge.net/) to assign custom functions to mouse buttons.

rkrishna · 03-06-2006, 04:01 AM

not an answer to ur question
but for newbeees in linux

u can use scroll button to copy paste(words, sentences etc.)it will keep the previously selected material to be pasted on the cursor location by a simgle press in the wheel.(it helps me to copy paste outputs, even in the text mode)
select the words-->move ur mouse cursor to the point where u wnat the selected text-->press wheel.

if u know more techniques plz send

cwwilson721 · 03-06-2006, 04:03 AM

Not quite what I was looking for.

I want to change the behavior of button 3 (I guess it's button 3...The button on the wheel.)

Changing the button number (xmodmap) doesn't do it.

I want to be able to change the BEHAVIOR of buttons, not the wheel (imwheel is not it either)

I'm looking for a configuration applet like what Windows has to change what the button does, not what the button is.

piete · 03-06-2006, 06:15 AM

imwheel will let you do what you want, I think. Basically with imwheel you can assign stuff to a mouse button ... fishing around the web picked up this little tidbit:

Code:

~/.imwheelrc
Configures a double click for the thumb button.
".*"
None, Thumb1, Button1, 2

Rummaging in the man pages of imwheel shows us that:

Code:

       Example:
              Shift_L|Button4
                  - meaning left shift and wheel up.
              Button5
                  - meaning wheel down.

I don't have the exact syntax available, but the man pages are long and descriptive and the example imwheelrc file is longer!

So, you could indeed do a double click on your middle mouse with imwheel if you're willing to work at it a bit =D

- Piete.

Fedorasjm · 03-17-2006, 03:50 PM

Picking up on "gbonvehi"'s suggestiong, I was able to use the "xmodmap" function to eliminate the annoying paste feature when accicentally clicking the scroll button. These mappings work well for me on my Suse distribution though I can't guarantee how it will work for you. But here goes. I entered the following command:
xmodmap -e "pointer = 1 3 6 4 5"

What this did for me is make my left button do nothing and made the scroll button click act like by left button. Although when scrolling this may make the left button menu pop up when accientally clicke while scrolling, at least no paste operation takes place and the menu will disappear as I continue to scroll.

Some observations on this are:
1) At least with Suse, a "3" (i.e. paste operation) will not take place unless both a "1 AND 2" button are defined (which is not the case in my mapping command)
2) A center click (i.e. "6" operation) causes a "2" (i.e. left click menu operation). This probably takes place because a 6 is an invalid button for a mouse with two buttons and a scroll wheel. Therefore, Suse X11 seems to have determined that the "2" button was the only valid button not defined so therefore when the scoll button wheel was clicked a "2" button operation was invoked.