Forward and backward mouse buttons - can it be done?

Ancient_Hermit · posted: 2016-02-29 17:28

Hello all,

Is it possible for MX-15 to make use of the forward and back buttons on my mouse?

I find them really handy and used to use them all the time, I keep pressing them and nothing happens, and that leaves one with a certain feeling of"broken".

The mouse settings picked my keyboard at first so there may be some issues in my install.

chrispop99 · posted: 2016-03-01 09:09

I have test-installed both MX14 and MX15 onto a wide range of hardware, and the extra mouse buttons have always worked in both the web-browser and the file browser, so your situation is somewhat unusual.

Did you check the MD5 of the file you downloaded to make certain it wasn't corrupted before you installed?

You could boot from the live media you used to install with to see if the buttons work there. If they do, something has corrupted your install perhaps.

You may get more responses to your enquiry if you are able to post in the MX & Mepis forum:

========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://forum.mepiscommunity.org/"
linktext was:"http://forum.mepiscommunity.org/"
====================================

Try to include basic details of your hardware by entering this in a terminal:

Code: Select all

inxi -F

then including the displayed details in your post.

I'm pretty confident this can be fixed.

Chris

dolphin_oracle · posted: 2016-03-01 14:22

mine"just works" as well. Its a Microsoft Intellimouse blue.

Your mouse model may be important. there is a particular logitech mouse I know that gives people fits because it uses some kind of weird properietary thing with a driver to work with windows. Most mice extra buttons just emulate a key press, but that mouse does something odd.

You could also try the X Event Viewer. Just run"xev" in a terminal, and you'll get a little test window. any clicks, keyboard typing or wheel rolling should show up in the terminal output. For my mouse, I needed to put the mouse cursor in the test box before the extra buttons registered in the viewer. Once you know the the keysyms for the extra buttons, it may be possible to remap those keys on your mouse, even if the mouse driver won't do it for you. You can copy and paste the output from the terminal window into a forum post and we can take a look.

Ancient_Hermit · posted: 2016-03-01 16:45

chrispop99 wrote:I have test-installed both MX14 and MX15 onto a wide range of hardware, and the extra mouse buttons have always worked in both the web-browser and the file browser, so your situation is somewhat unusual.

Did you check the MD5 of the file you downloaded to make certain it wasn't corrupted before you installed?

You could boot from the live media you used to install with to see if the buttons work there. If they do, something has corrupted your install perhaps.

You may get more responses to your enquiry if you are able to post in the MX & Mepis forum:

========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://forum.mepiscommunity.org/"
linktext was:"http://forum.mepiscommunity.org/"
====================================

Try to include basic details of your hardware by entering this in a terminal:
Code: Select all
inxi -F
then including the displayed details in your post.

I'm pretty confident this can be fixed.

Chris

Thanks!

ok, yes I checked MD5 at the time and it was fine.

I'd try that live install media thing once I can get to the hardware adequately again, it's in a tricky spot! Got to get a USB3 hub to ease that!

I seem to have the wrong forum then. It did look like the right place, but it seems maybe it is not. I'll get onto that other one then.

I can get that listing apparently so I will probably post that before very much longer! Just have to find my way to do it! __{{emoticon}}__

Glad to hear it looks fixable. It's like a comedy of errors here right now as only day 4 and I have made a few tweaks but clearly not enough as the machine keeps taking off and doing something clever which I had not foreseen! I'm finding ways to turn off the clever as it's making things a bit tougher than is strictly helpful. I'll probably appreciate them after but right now they are making it a taller/steeper hill to climb. I'm exhausted by it so have to keep taking naps as us older chaps have to. __{{emoticon}}__

I'll be back! __{{emoticon}}__

Ancient_Hermit · posted: 2016-03-01 17:04

dolphin_oracle wrote:mine"just works" as well. Its a Microsoft Intellimouse blue.

Your mouse model may be important. there is a particular logitech mouse I know that gives people fits because it uses some kind of weird properietary thing with a driver to work with windows. Most mice extra buttons just emulate a key press, but that mouse does something odd.

You could also try the X Event Viewer. Just run"xev" in a terminal, and you'll get a little test window. any clicks, keyboard typing or wheel rolling should show up in the terminal output. For my mouse, I needed to put the mouse cursor in the test box before the extra buttons registered in the viewer. Once you know the the keysyms for the extra buttons, it may be possible to remap those keys on your mouse, even if the mouse driver won't do it for you. You can copy and paste the output from the terminal window into a forum post and we can take a look.

Mouse is Trust GXT 31 as far as I can decipher from the trendy graphics. There is a another hieroglyph there but it is so clever that I can't understand it. __{{emoticon}}__

That xev is a bit mad, it says a lot but I can't make much of what it does say, however one of the two buttons seems to get it a bit excited.

I found also that the M$ keyboard has added to the problems and either the system can't tell it's a keyboard, or it's announcing itself as a mouse - no idea which of course, anyway things got better once I told the mouse requester to disable the keyboard and concentrate on the mouse, which shows up twice, rather confusingly!

Now the keyboard is out of the mouse setting mix, the mouse buttons work sometimes, but back to front! __{{emoticon}}__

I'd like to fix that as I am also using it on the now headless windows 7 box via tightvnc. The buttons work fine in the VNC window. Having said this the mouse works the best it ever has with some of it's other functions on the MX-15 box. (resolutions in particular) It's confusing having two version for the mouse buttons and especially if using VNC.

Oh well, becoming a windows refugee is not going too bad over all.

Ancient_Hermit · posted: 2016-03-02 00:41

I finally got to figure it out, Here you go Chris;

Code: Select all

System:    Host: bridget Kernel: 4.2.0-0.bpo.1-amd64 x86_64 (64 bit) Desktop: Xfce 4.12.2
           Distro: MX-15_x64 Fusion 24 December 2015
Machine:   Mobo: ASRock model: Q1900DC-ITX Bios: American Megatrends v: P1.20 date: 07/08/2014
CPU:       Quad core Intel Celeron J1900 (-MCP-) cache: 1024 KB 
           clock speeds: max: 2415 MHz 1: 1653 MHz 2: 1650 MHz 3: 1341 MHz 4: 1825 MHz
Graphics:  Card: Intel Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series Graphics & Display
           Display Server: X.Org 1.16.4 drivers: intel (unloaded: fbdev,vesa) Resolution: 1680x1050@59.95hz
           GLX Renderer: Mesa DRI Intel Bay Trail GLX Version: 3.0 Mesa 10.3.2
Audio:     Card-1 Intel Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series High Definition Audio Controller
           driver: snd_hda_intel
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture v: k4.2.0-0.bpo.1-amd64
Network:   Card: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller driver: r8169
           IF: eth0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: d0:50:99:59:15:1e
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 120.0GB (66.0% used) ID-1: /dev/sda model: KINGSTON_SV300S3 size: 120.0GB
Partition: ID-1: / size: 108G used: 72G (71%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda1
           ID-2: swap-1 size: 2.17GB used: 0.00GB (0%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sda2
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 26.8C mobo: N/A
           Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A
Info:      Processes: 165 Uptime: 4:37 Memory: 813.7/15506.2MB Client: Shell (bash) inxi: 2.2.31

I hope I got the code posting bit right, never done that before.

386solardrain · posted: 2016-04-14 19:43

Thanks for mentioning it, I hadn't tried mine and that's what they did straightaway using Microsoft Wireless Laser Mouse 6000.
You saved me time!
There have been reports over the last decade of mice delivering keyboard events and of course of device interference (esp. in cases of the next cube over.)
I wonder what /var/logs/X11.log has to say about the mouse? Any entries and dispositions/warnings there? (e.g. '[II] Ancillary buttons unfamiliar: unbound for now')
# synclient -l should work and offer hints sort of like
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url was:"https://wiki.debian.org/SynapticsTouchpad"
linktext was:"https://wiki.debian.org/SynapticsTouchpad"
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if it's emulating a Synaptics touchpad.
Then there's checking
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url was:"https://help.ubuntu.com/community/ManyButtonsMouseHowto"
linktext was:"https://help.ubuntu.com/community/ManyButtonsMouseHowto"
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...and maybe
========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
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linktext was:"http://askubuntu.com/questions/152297/h ... tech-mouse"
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