7 ms·

Agreed. I'd love to use Wayland for everyday use but the libinput touchpad drivers are impossible. Like you stated, the big problem is very fine movements just

by acabal 6y ago

Agreed. I'd love to use Wayland for everyday use but the libinput touchpad drivers are impossible. Like you stated, the big problem is very fine movements just don't work in libinput. On X11/synaptics I can make movements as fine as rolling my fingertip in place on the touchpad, or drawing a minuscule circle, and it will pick it up. Libinput on the same touchpad does nothing, it's like it's stuck in molasses. And libinput has almost no configuration options so there's nothing I can even tweak. I really hope they address this soon, or I'll be stuck on X11 forever! Edit: I'm using a Thinkpad P1 Gen2, a top-tier recent-gen workstation laptop, and this is a big enough problem where it's forcing me to use X11 on Ubuntu 20.04.

kelnos 6y ago
Odd, I'm using libinput (Dell XPS 9380), and don't see the problems you describe. With my index finger on the touchpad, I can "roll" my finger a little in any direction (without actually sliding the finger), and the mouse moves a few pixels immediately. It's hard to get single-pixel accuracy, but 2-pixel accuracy is doable. I also have no trouble tracing the Y Combinator logo.
- Polylactic_acid 6y ago
  I also have a dell xps but I'm on X11 right now due to teams screen sharing. I also have no problems doing exactly the same thing while my sisters MSI laptop on windows makes it almost impossible to move the pointer less than an cm on screen. I suspect this is more a hardware issue than software.
  - mlyle 6y ago
    Nah, it's software that has a broken logic for when to enable hysteresis for a touchpad and make it mushy, when most touchpads that it does this for will do much better without it.
arghwhat 6y ago
> In X11/synaptics I can make movements as fine as rolling my fingertip in place on the touchpad, or drawing a minuscule circle, and it will pick it up. Libinput on the same touchpad does nothing Just tried that on my Dell XPS on sway (wayland, thus libinput), and rolling the tip of my finger on the touchpad allows me to move the cursor in single-pixel increments on an unscaled 4k display. :/ Maybe this is a libinput issue specific to your touchpad type?
- tonyhb 6y ago
  Agreed. Libinput on an XPS, having no issues over here. I actually prefer it to my past MBP's from 10 years. Tested on the 2015, 2017, and 2019 models and libinput/XPS is much nicer to use.
  - siikanen98 6y ago
    100% agree with you. I have XPS 15 (9570) and I use libinput on sway. I have dual boot with W10 and I'm always amazed how much better the touchpad feels on linux. Sure windows has better gesture support but I've always felt them sluggish and controlling sway through the keyboard is lightning fast so I really have not missed gestures much. However for browser etc 2-finger swipe to go back would be nice to see
- mlyle 6y ago
  Lots of touchpads (most, I believe) trigger hysteresis in libinput unnecessarily, either because of a declared fuzz value by the touchpad or because of the broken heuristic, and it's mushy afterwards. But no, it's not all.
albertzeyer 6y ago
"They" (I assume you mean libinput devs) is just one single developer, namely Peter Hutterer. See this discussion: libinput's bus factor is 1, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23254871 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23254871
- acabal 6y ago
  "They" is really Red Hat, who are the ones pushing libinput and Wayland in the first place; and I imagine they would have no problem fixing this quickly if they hired more than one person to work on it.
  - IceWreck 6y ago
    Why does the Linux community as a whole rely on one company to fix a lot of their problems ?
    - pabs3 6y ago
      Which other companies do you think should be pitching in but aren't?
      - fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
        Don’t other large companies issue Linux laptops to their employees? I’d think somewhere like Google or Amazon would find it worthwhile to devote some funds to improving desktop Linux.
        thrwo42343 6y ago
        Google employees mostly use Macs AFAICT.
        pabs3 6y ago
        Google does have their own desktop Debian derivative called gLinux, but I haven't heard anything about Amazon having one. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLinux https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLinux
p12tic 6y ago
Fixing issues like this is the primary goal of this project. Unfortunately there's a long way to go.
JoshTriplett 6y ago
I'm using Wayland and libinput on an X1 Carbon, which I'd expect to use a very comparable touchpad, and it works flawlessly. I easily can move the mouse by individual pixels by just rolling my finger, or throw it across the screen. You may want to experiment with your desktop environment's mouse settings, and if that doesn't help, you should consider providing a detailed report to the libinput folks and see if they can address it.
- ghostpepper 6y ago
  Which wayland environment are you using?
  - JoshTriplett 6y ago
    gnome-shell 3.38
- harrygeez 6y ago
  I'm guessing it has to do with the trackpads' sensor resolution. MacBooks and newer laptops have high resolution glass trackpads that are much more precise
Liskni_si 6y ago
You're most likely experiencing https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/libinput/libinput/-/issues/286 https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/libinput/libinput/-/issues/28.... The workaround is very simple: just comment out the tp_detect_wobbling call in tp_process_state. The real fix is a bit more involved, and I've been meaning to get to it for the last few years, but since commenting out that one line just works, there's little motivation.
- sippingjippers 6y ago
  It's cool bro, just recompile libinput after commenting out this line. 2020, year of the Linux desktop :)
  - weikju 6y ago
    YES to user empowerment.
    - mlyle 6y ago
      YES to shipping something that's broken for many people, but that at least 1 in 1000 of them will dig up some esoteric knowledge, patch and recompile packages that many others depend upon, and "fix it"?
      - sangnoir 6y ago
        > YES to shipping something that's broken for many people, but that at least 1 in 1000 of them will dig up some esoteric knowledge, patch and recompile packages that many others depend upon, and "fix it"? All software is broken in some way, so everyone says yes to shipping something that's broken. All things considered, it's not an important feature, especially considering it has a work-around. They have have the ticket for the issue and it's on a backlog. As with all software projects, they have to triage bugs, prioritize their work and allocate resources. The awesome thing about open source is that anyone can create a patch for the fix, and resolve it for everyone. Compare this to some Apple Radar bugs that are old enough to vote, but only Apple employees can fix.
vladvasiliu 6y ago
As others have said, I'm not noticing this issue either on my HP ProBook 430 g5. It has a Synaptics touchpad, though not sure which model. xinput says "SYNA3067:00 06CB:8265 Touchpad". Tried it on the integrated 13" FHD screen as well as on an external 24" FHD screen. I can move the cursors easily along the branches of the Y in page header.
zx2c4 6y ago
> Edit: I'm using a Thinkpad P1 Gen2, a top-tier recent-gen workstation laptop, and this is a big enough problem where it's forcing me to use X11 on Ubuntu 20.04. I'm also on a P1gen2. I just added support for the Trackpoint/Thinkpad through the more advanced RMI4 interface in the kernel, instead of going through PS/2 emulation mode: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.git/commit/?id=a6977d758fed511a9977639465689785ac398b01 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.g... https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.git/commit/?id=127e4a1bc11e0e3d30f4d20bb888a1f680296990 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.g... This will be in Linux 5.10 and should improve things quite a bit.
- juancampa 6y ago
  This is great news, thanks for your work. Can you elaborate on what's better about RMI4? Also you said Trackpoint/Thinkpad. Did you mean Trackpoint/Trackpad?
quicklime 6y ago
That's strange, I'm running Ubuntu 20.04 on a MacBook Air, and I have no problems moving my cursor in a small circle around the "Y". Probably the only thing I do differently from the default is that I use Wayland instead of Xorg. I don't have any proprietary additional drivers installed. I would've assumed this was a hardware issue - what else do we have set up differently?

by acabal 6y ago

kelnos 6y ago

Odd, I'm using libinput (Dell XPS 9380), and don't see the problems you describe. With my index finger on the touchpad, I can "roll" my finger a little in any direction (without actually sliding the finger), and the mouse moves a few pixels immediately. It's hard to get single-pixel accuracy, but 2-pixel accuracy is doable. I also have no trouble tracing the Y Combinator logo.

Polylactic_acid 6y ago
I also have a dell xps but I'm on X11 right now due to teams screen sharing. I also have no problems doing exactly the same thing while my sisters MSI laptop on windows makes it almost impossible to move the pointer less than an cm on screen. I suspect this is more a hardware issue than software.
- mlyle 6y ago
  Nah, it's software that has a broken logic for when to enable hysteresis for a touchpad and make it mushy, when most touchpads that it does this for will do much better without it.

arghwhat 6y ago

> In X11/synaptics I can make movements as fine as rolling my fingertip in place on the touchpad, or drawing a minuscule circle, and it will pick it up. Libinput on the same touchpad does nothing Just tried that on my Dell XPS on sway (wayland, thus libinput), and rolling the tip of my finger on the touchpad allows me to move the cursor in single-pixel increments on an unscaled 4k display. :/ Maybe this is a libinput issue specific to your touchpad type?

tonyhb 6y ago
Agreed. Libinput on an XPS, having no issues over here. I actually prefer it to my past MBP's from 10 years. Tested on the 2015, 2017, and 2019 models and libinput/XPS is much nicer to use.
- siikanen98 6y ago
  100% agree with you. I have XPS 15 (9570) and I use libinput on sway. I have dual boot with W10 and I'm always amazed how much better the touchpad feels on linux. Sure windows has better gesture support but I've always felt them sluggish and controlling sway through the keyboard is lightning fast so I really have not missed gestures much. However for browser etc 2-finger swipe to go back would be nice to see
mlyle 6y ago
Lots of touchpads (most, I believe) trigger hysteresis in libinput unnecessarily, either because of a declared fuzz value by the touchpad or because of the broken heuristic, and it's mushy afterwards. But no, it's not all.

albertzeyer 6y ago

"They" (I assume you mean libinput devs) is just one single developer, namely Peter Hutterer. See this discussion: libinput's bus factor is 1, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23254871 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23254871

acabal 6y ago
"They" is really Red Hat, who are the ones pushing libinput and Wayland in the first place; and I imagine they would have no problem fixing this quickly if they hired more than one person to work on it.
- IceWreck 6y ago
  Why does the Linux community as a whole rely on one company to fix a lot of their problems ?
  - pabs3 6y ago
    Which other companies do you think should be pitching in but aren't?
    - fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
      Don’t other large companies issue Linux laptops to their employees? I’d think somewhere like Google or Amazon would find it worthwhile to devote some funds to improving desktop Linux.
      - thrwo42343 6y ago
        Google employees mostly use Macs AFAICT.
      - pabs3 6y ago
        Google does have their own desktop Debian derivative called gLinux, but I haven't heard anything about Amazon having one. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLinux https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLinux

p12tic 6y ago

Fixing issues like this is the primary goal of this project. Unfortunately there's a long way to go.

JoshTriplett 6y ago

I'm using Wayland and libinput on an X1 Carbon, which I'd expect to use a very comparable touchpad, and it works flawlessly. I easily can move the mouse by individual pixels by just rolling my finger, or throw it across the screen. You may want to experiment with your desktop environment's mouse settings, and if that doesn't help, you should consider providing a detailed report to the libinput folks and see if they can address it.

ghostpepper 6y ago
Which wayland environment are you using?
- JoshTriplett 6y ago
  gnome-shell 3.38
harrygeez 6y ago
I'm guessing it has to do with the trackpads' sensor resolution. MacBooks and newer laptops have high resolution glass trackpads that are much more precise

Liskni_si 6y ago

You're most likely experiencing https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/libinput/libinput/-/issues/286 https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/libinput/libinput/-/issues/28.... The workaround is very simple: just comment out the tp_detect_wobbling call in tp_process_state. The real fix is a bit more involved, and I've been meaning to get to it for the last few years, but since commenting out that one line just works, there's little motivation.

sippingjippers 6y ago
It's cool bro, just recompile libinput after commenting out this line. 2020, year of the Linux desktop :)
- weikju 6y ago
  YES to user empowerment.
  - mlyle 6y ago
    YES to shipping something that's broken for many people, but that at least 1 in 1000 of them will dig up some esoteric knowledge, patch and recompile packages that many others depend upon, and "fix it"?
    - sangnoir 6y ago
      > YES to shipping something that's broken for many people, but that at least 1 in 1000 of them will dig up some esoteric knowledge, patch and recompile packages that many others depend upon, and "fix it"? All software is broken in some way, so everyone says yes to shipping something that's broken. All things considered, it's not an important feature, especially considering it has a work-around. They have have the ticket for the issue and it's on a backlog. As with all software projects, they have to triage bugs, prioritize their work and allocate resources. The awesome thing about open source is that anyone can create a patch for the fix, and resolve it for everyone. Compare this to some Apple Radar bugs that are old enough to vote, but only Apple employees can fix.

vladvasiliu 6y ago

As others have said, I'm not noticing this issue either on my HP ProBook 430 g5. It has a Synaptics touchpad, though not sure which model. xinput says "SYNA3067:00 06CB:8265 Touchpad". Tried it on the integrated 13" FHD screen as well as on an external 24" FHD screen. I can move the cursors easily along the branches of the Y in page header.

zx2c4 6y ago

> Edit: I'm using a Thinkpad P1 Gen2, a top-tier recent-gen workstation laptop, and this is a big enough problem where it's forcing me to use X11 on Ubuntu 20.04. I'm also on a P1gen2. I just added support for the Trackpoint/Thinkpad through the more advanced RMI4 interface in the kernel, instead of going through PS/2 emulation mode: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.git/commit/?id=a6977d758fed511a9977639465689785ac398b01 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.g... https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.git/commit/?id=127e4a1bc11e0e3d30f4d20bb888a1f680296990 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dtor/input.g... This will be in Linux 5.10 and should improve things quite a bit.

juancampa 6y ago
This is great news, thanks for your work. Can you elaborate on what's better about RMI4? Also you said Trackpoint/Thinkpad. Did you mean Trackpoint/Trackpad?

quicklime 6y ago

That's strange, I'm running Ubuntu 20.04 on a MacBook Air, and I have no problems moving my cursor in a small circle around the "Y". Probably the only thing I do differently from the default is that I use Wayland instead of Xorg. I don't have any proprietary additional drivers installed. I would've assumed this was a hardware issue - what else do we have set up differently?