Disable Touchpad while using trackpoin on Thinkpad E430

Thinkpad E430 has both a trackpoint and a touchpad. The touchpad is disable when typing. However, when I'm using the trackpoint, I often touch thetouchpad as well, and generate mouse clicks I'd like to avoid. So, I need tofind out a solution to disable touchpad while I'm using trackpoint or typing.

xinput is a utility to list available input devices, query informationabout a device and change input device settings. Here's my solution:

1. From xinput list grep touchpad device name:
   $ xinput --list | grep -i touchpad
   from outputs, I got the device's name:

   ⎜   ↳ SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad               id=15   [slave  pointer  (2)]
   

   maybe your id is not 15, but that's not matter. What we need just 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad'
2. write

   xinput set-prop 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad' 'Device Enabled' 0
   

   into StartUp Applications Preferences

That's all right.

But after that, I make a directory in $HOME/bin and code a shell script touchpad:

#! /bin/sh

PATH=/sbin:/bin:/usr/bin

. /lib/lsb/init-functions

do_start() {
    exec xinput set-prop 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad' 'Device Enabled' 1
}

do_stop() {
    exec xinput set-prop 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad' 'Device Enabled' 0
}

case "$1" in
    start)
        do_start
        ;;
    restart|reload|force-reload)
        echo "Error: argument '$1' not supported" >&2
        exit 3
        ;;
    stop)
        do_stop
        ;;
    *)
        echo "Usage: $0 start|stop" >&2
        exit 3
        ;;
esac

and make a link to /etc/init.d/touchpad, so when i need touchpad enable, I can type:

$ sudo /etc/init.d/touchpad start

or if I don't need it again:

$ sudo /etc/init.d/touchpad stop

That's funny.

Author: Shusheng Shaw<[email protected]>

Date: 2014-02-13 14:33:10 HKT

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