X/Mouse Extra Buttons HOWTO

[greenbob]

I would suggest placing those lines in the file /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc
You could make your own file .xinitrc and place it in your home directory but for a newb I would not recommend this. And you do not need an execute command, just put that line in the file, do this towards middle of file, usually right after it loads xmodmap. And be sure to place the xmodmap line before the imwheel line.

[DeepThoughts]

I still can't get it to work... Could someone take a look at my /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc and tell where to put it and how to put it?

[greenbob]

It's working b/c its not in there at all. Try this instead using the 9 button method posted by ecatmur, which works even if you don't have 9 buttons, and is the one I'm currently using. Then you must make a file called .imwheelrc and place this in your home directory, just copy the one listed in the 9 button method, you may want to add some lines for mozilla, if that is what you use.

[Hairshorts]

I'm having trouble getting my side button to work with imwheel. I have an intellimouse mouseman optical USB mouse which has a scroll wheel and one side button. If I run xev before running imwheel I can generate ButtonPress events with the side button, and it shows up as button 6, so I think my XF86Config is set up correctly. I then run

[stormer]

Attention!

ehci-hcd is no enough driver support to get the wheel working whit sis usb controller.
You have to compile ohci-hcd too, with both every thing works find with IMPS/2 drivers.

It is true for both 2.4 and 2.6 kernel.
Have fun!

p.s. It is probably the same whit Via chips using uhci-hcd.
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Stormer

[OliD]

[jerome187]

[ecatmur]

Ah... well, this could be interesting.
I guess the first thing to do is to check whether the little button produces any X events at all, by clicking it over an xev window. You should do this with the ZAxisMapping turned off to see which button event it generates (I'm guessing 6, after the standard 5 for left-middle-right-back-forward).

If it does signal on button 6, you'll then need a ZAxisMapping of "7 8 9 10" (and Buttons "10") to prevent it overwriting that button, however that's where it gets interesting. As imwheel only currently supports 9 butons you'll need to either modify the source yourself or persuade the developer to modify it (hint: the quickest - if not the cheapest - way to get him to do this would be to buy him one of those mice to 'test with').
Once that's done it's plain sailing - use an xmodmap of "pointer = 1 2 3 8 9 10 4 5 6 7" and whatever the new button is now called in imwheelrc.

If X doesn't detect the little button, you'd have to look into modifying the mouse driver itself. - personally I view the X source tree as about twice as arcane and scary as the kernel tree...

[jerome187]

The two little buttons on either sides of the scroll wheel are just buttons 4 and 5, just like the scrool wheel is (I confirmed this in xev, and they act just like the scroll wheel also) So I dont think I need to worry about those 2 little buttons at all, I think there just extra 4 and 5 butons, thats all (or at least thats what there acting like).

The other little button dosent generate anything in xev tho Would really like to get it working so I can map it to Alt-Tab for easy window switching.

[richjoyce]

I have this mouse too (cordless mx 700) and although I haven't got them working yet (because I haven't had time, haven't tried) I can tell you this mouse has 8 different buttons. The two buttons (1,2), the middle mouse button (3), the scroll up (4), scroll down (5) buttons above and below the wheel, and the wheel is also 4 & 5, and then the two side buttons (6,7) and then the windows changing button (function in windows) (8\)

I think the problem is, that jerome does not have the scroll wheel mapped as the last two buttons. You have them as 6,7 and they should be 7,8, and then the physical 8 button should be 6

[woodwizzle]

I can't get my 2 other buttons to generate events. I added everything to my XF86COnfig and .xsession files. I looked at my log output and xmodmap gets an error saying bad number of buttons (5 instead of 7).

[lucida]

I'm using an Intellimouse Explorer 3 w/2 side buttons, and I have troubles with them.

I set the XF86Config and xmodmap as described, and, I got two events when I press down one of the side buttons(button 6 and button2), and another 2 events when I released the button. Press another side button give me 7 and 3.

Does anyone encounters the same problem?

[xHemi]

You guys should try to add a -p to your imwheel call. Like so:

[Markus_T]

[InfinityX]

I've almost managed to get my MX500 working. It works fine if I type the xmod line into a terminal and start imwheel, but I just can't get it work when kde starts.

I placed the lines in the xinitrc (which I confess I haven't the slightest clue what's for). Care to help a dumbfounded newbie?

[tsigo]

I've tried putting the xmodmap command in both ~/.xinitrc and ~/.xsession, neither makes a difference. I've put it in my main user's folder and also /root. Do I have to do something different if I use xdm (kdm) instead of startx?

[theonlymcc]

For anyone using a laptop with a touchpad and wanting to use a USB Intellimouse with the side buttons, this is for you. I triple checked all the files and options related to geting the side buttons working. No matter what I did, the side buttons would scroll and the wheel would do nothing. I fixed this by reversing two things in the XF86Config.
1.) Changed my touchpad from CorePointer to SendCoreEvents
2.) Change my usb mouse from SendCoreEvents to CorePointer.
Presto it worked. I am using a Dell i5150 if anyone is wondering.

P.S. - We (NC State, looking at my profile to the left, I live in Raleigh and go State) raped Duke tonight! YAY!!!!

[mholtz]

Yeah I noticed the same thing. Apparently in X, if you want to use two pointers simultaneously, one has to be the CorePointer and the other can merely SendCoreEvents. xmodmap can only modify the core pointer.

In my case, I have a plain jane two button PS/2 mouse and a 7 button USB optical intellimouse. I also had to move the Intellimouse to be the CorePointer in order to remap the buttons.

Is there no other way to remap buttons on non-CorePointer pointers? What if I wanted one mouse to be right handed and the other left handed, for example?

[metalh34d]

Ok so I've tried to get my thumb buttons working. I first attempted the 9 button trick but that made it so my scroller didnt even work. I use a Logitec MX700 btw. Ok so basically what happens so far is any program I do if I use the button thumb button it does a middle click. If I do the top button it does a right click. Here's my xinit settings:

xmodmap -e "pointer = 1 2 3 6 7 4 5"
imwheel -k -b -p "67" -f
kahakai

my .imwheelrc looks like this atm:

"Firefox.*"
None, Up, Alt_L|Left
None, Down, Alt_L|Right

".*"
None, Up, Alt_L|Left
None, Down, Alt_L|Right

XF86Config:

Identifier "Mouse1"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "IMPS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "Buttons" "7"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "6 7"


Any input on the matter?

[TenPin]

I have a Logitech MX300 and I like to use the little button on top as my middle button and I never use the wheel as a button:

[allancairns]

Hey guys,

Some great advice here. How about helping someone with an older device?

I'm running a Logitech Trackman Marble so old the model # has worn off the bottom (I got it in about 1998 I think). It is a trackball arrangement and has three buttons and NO SCROLLWHEEL.

When I use this mouse in Windows clicking the middle button results in a small icon popping up on my screen where the mouse pointer was that looks like four arrows pointing NSEW. Moving my pointer from this icon results in the active window scrolling in the direction I moved the pointer. This is great as it handles up-down AND left-right scrolling as well as scrolling at different speeds (depending on how far you move from the icon). You then click again on the middle button to get out of scroll mode.

Is there anything like this in Linux? I love this mouse (no problems with limited deskspace, great for gaming) but I find it a pain not having scroll in windows without a scrollbar (eg. transparent eterm) and even moving my mouse over to the scrollbar where it exists is annoying after my experience in Windows.

TIA,
_________________
Allan
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There is no 'I' in team, but there is a 'me' if you look hard enough

[helmers]

I'd also like some help.

I've gotten a new, very nice mice, from Microsoft.
It's an Intellimouse Explorer 4, see it here:
http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/mouseandkeyboard/productdetails.aspx?pid=003#

The problem is that I would like to use all it's fancy features:
- The tilt wheel, to scroll horizontally
- The back and forward buttons

I've never had much luck with imwheel, could someone give me some easy steps to follow? The scrollwheel is on buttons "4 5" like regular mice.

Thanks!
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[psofa]

will someone make this sticky? it worked for me!
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psofa

[helmers]

It is in the tips and tricks section, I think there are many good threads here, and making one sticky and not all the others wouldn't be all nice.

What would be nice where if someone (with a lot of time and dedication) could go through these tips, and create a large document, divided into categories of tips.

I often find myself strolling these pages, but it is sometimes hard to find what one is looking for, even with the search function.
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[calhoun]

bump