[blfs-support] Touchpad in Xorg-7

[Hans Malissa via blfs-support]

I just finished building the X Window System Environment following the instructions given in BLFS 8.3-systemd, and I'm now at the "Xorg-7 Testing and Configuration" stage. My X window system seems to be mostly working, but for some reason I can't get the touchpad on my laptop to work.
X windows (started with startx) does not react to touchpad control at all, but when I plug in an external USB mouse, it works. It seems as if I'm missing some driver.
# xinput list
gives me two entries in the pointer section: "Virtual core XTEST pointer" and "PixArt USB Optical Mouse".
I'm not even sure if the problem is related to X windows, or if there's something missing at a deeper lever:
# cat /proc/bus/input/devices
lists several entries, including the "PixArt USB Optical Mouse", but nothing related to a touchpad.
Also, in /dev/input, I have 'mice' and 'mouse0', but both are only reading the external mouse, not the touchpad.
What am I missing? Some kernel module or such? I've been looking through the kernel configuration, but I can't find anything obvious.
Thanks a lot,

Hans

[Ken Moffat via blfs-support]

I just finished building the X Window System Environment following the instructions given in BLFS 8.3-systemd, and I'm now at the "Xorg-7 Testing and Configuration" stage. My X window system seems to be mostly working, but for some reason I can't get the touchpad on my laptop to work.
X windows (started with startx) does not react to touchpad control at all, but when I plug in an external USB mouse, it works. It seems as if I'm missing some driver.
# xinput list
gives me two entries in the pointer section: "Virtual core XTEST pointer" and "PixArt USB Optical Mouse".
# cat /proc/bus/input/devices
lists several entries, including the "PixArt USB Optical Mouse", but nothing related to a touchpad.
Also, in /dev/input, I have 'mice' and 'mouse0', but both are only reading the external mouse, not the touchpad.
What am I missing? Some kernel module or such? I've been looking through the kernel configuration, but I can't find anything obvious.
Thanks a lot,
Hans

If your laptop is a common model and the manufacturer has not
re-used the model name for a completely different model, google with
the model name and linux might help. Particularly any reports of
installation successes or problems. OTOH I was looking at AMD
laptops the other day, then trying to find out about device support -
for several large manufacturers, putting in a model name returned
several intel models, which did not give me any confidence about
what the AMD item used.

Maybe a kernel driver (or, perhaps, extra options enabled for a
driver - I've seen that on e.g. audio and network drivers, not sure
if any touchpads have similar options), or maybe something in X.

The other option is lspci -vv to see what is present. Maybe best
run on a distro kernel (in case it needs a kernel driver you have
not enabled in your LFS kernel). Similarly, lsmod on a distro
kernel where the trackpad is working - to see which modules are
loaded.

From the output of lspci, if you can identify the trackpad you might
be able to google for it.

In theory, for trackpads libinput (rather than evdev) ought to have
better support, I've certainly seen trackpads mentioned in the
changelogs, but also disheartening comments about how they can
differ.

ĸen

[Hans Malissa via blfs-support]

On Dec 01, 2018, at 03:39 PM, Ken Moffat via blfs-support <blfs-***@lists.linuxfromscratch.org> wrote:
On Sat, Dec 01, 2018 at 09:52:58PM +0000, Hans Malissa via blfs-support wrote:
I just finished building the X Window System Environment following the instructions given in BLFS 8.3-systemd, and I'm now at the "Xorg-7 Testing and Configuration" stage. My X window system seems to be mostly working, but for some reason I can't get the touchpad on my laptop to work.
X windows (started with startx) does not react to touchpad control at all, but when I plug in an external USB mouse, it works. It seems as if I'm missing some driver.
# xinput list
gives me two entries in the pointer section: "Virtual core XTEST pointer" and "PixArt USB Optical Mouse".
I'm not even sure if the problem is related to X windows, or if there's something missing at a deeper lever:
# cat /proc/bus/input/devices
lists several entries, including the "PixArt USB Optical Mouse", but nothing related to a touchpad.
Also, in /dev/input, I have 'mice' and 'mouse0', but both are only reading the external mouse, not the touchpad.
What am I missing? Some kernel module or such? I've been looking through the kernel configuration, but I can't find anything obvious.
Thanks a lot,

Hans

If your laptop is a common model and the manufacturer has not
re-used the model name for a completely different model, google with
the model name and linux might help. Particularly any reports of
installation successes or problems. OTOH I was looking at AMD
laptops the other day, then trying to find out about device support -
for several large manufacturers, putting in a model name returned
several intel models, which did not give me any confidence about
what the AMD item used.

Maybe a kernel driver (or, perhaps, extra options enabled for a
driver - I've seen that on e.g. audio and network drivers, not sure
if any touchpads have similar options), or maybe something in X.

The other option is lspci -vv to see what is present. Maybe best
run on a distro kernel (in case it needs a kernel driver you have
not enabled in your LFS kernel). Similarly, lsmod on a distro
kernel where the trackpad is working - to see which modules are
loaded.

From the output of lspci, if you can identify the trackpad you might
be able to google for it.

In theory, for trackpads libinput (rather than evdev) ought to have
better support, I've certainly seen trackpads mentioned in the
changelogs, but also disheartening comments about how they can
differ.

Äžen

Yes, running a distro kernel was the solution. I needed a few kernel modules that I hadn't selected before (i2c_hid, i2c_designware, intel-lpss). Now it's working.
I booted into Arch Linux, and /proc/bus/input/devices gave all that information away.
Thanks a lot.

Hans