How to disable laptop trackpad touchpad? [Solved]

[Member spaz]

Hi All.
No posts on this forum about this question that I can see.
Is there a GUI method to disable / toggle laptop trackpad / touchpad?
The touchpad / trackpad is typically more of hindrance than a help to me.
Occassionally useful, but it is sensitive enough to keep flicking the cursor around while I type, setting my typing in various places in a document while I type. Quite annoying. It would be good to have a fast way to enable / disable / toggle touchpad.
I know it can be done via terminal somehow, but for sake of speed would be nice if there is a GUI option on this?
My laptop has a pointstick too, and I would prefer to stick to using only this most of the time.
Thanks.

• This topic was modified 2 months, 3 weeks ago by spaz.

[Member afghan]

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I use synclient utility.

# turn off
synclient TouchpadOff=1

# turn on
synclient TouchpadOff=0

Beware of people who knows nothing; they are the ones that won't know that they know nothing.

[Member Robin]

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Not a GUI method, but a command line method. Forum search Forum search will come up with e.g. some hints like that:
How to disable laptop touchpad

And from this post you can learn how to bind the command to an unused button-combination of your keyboard, so you’ll need to press a single button only to activate/deactivate the touchpad in an instant. Would that method perform action speedy enough?

Windows is like a submarine. Open a window and serious problems will start.

[Member techore]

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spaz, does your laptop have a key to toggle the touchpad? Even if it doesn’t, you can assign a key combo to execute a script to toggle the touchpad on and off.

Here is the one I use.

https://gitlab.com/techore/antix-dwm/-/blob/main/file/bin/touchpad-toggle.sh

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Project: antix-dwm
# Location: /usr/local/bin/toggle-touchpad.sh
# Dependency: xinput
# Description: Simple script to enable or disable touchpad and
# send a desktop notification using libnotify.
# Usage: dwm calls on use of XF86XK_TouchpadToggle 

SEND_NOTIFICATION=true

declare -i ID
ID=<code>xinput list | grep -Eio '(touchpad|glidepoint)\s*id\=[0-9]{1,2}' | grep -Eo '[0-9]{1,2}'</code>

declare -i STATE
STATE=<code>xinput list-props $ID|grep 'Device Enabled'|awk '{print $4}'</code>

if [ $STATE -eq 1 ]; then
    xinput disable $ID
    echo Touchpad disabled.
    notify-send 'Touchpad disabled' -t 3000
else
    xinput enable $ID
    echo Touchpad enabled.
    notify-send 'Touchpad enabled' -t 3000
fi

At some point, I will get around to creating a script that identifies if a mouse is connected and disabled the touchpad. On my “To do” list.

• This reply was modified 2 months, 3 weeks ago by techore.

[Member spaz]

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afghan :
Thank you!
I know I asked for GUI, but I have to say, I love this synclient utility!
I have never heard of it, but it is great. Thank you!
##############
robin ::
THANKS! (:
That is even handier! I DID search the forum – and got no results – however I think I searched for “trackpad” which does indeed give no results.
Sorry, this was my bad. Lazy tired searching.

I LOVE the post for binding to a keyboard combo. I am very keyboard shortcut driven.
It’s my favourite way to drive.
That post will help me out very much!
##############
techore :
Same as for robin :
AWESOME! Thank you, I love these keybinding methods.
No, I do not have a built in toggle key (I haven’t seen this on a lappie before),
but I will certainly be using these key combo bindings.
##############
Everybody :
Thank you!
The keybindings are even better (MUCH BETTER) than the GUI option.
I’m now also mostly convinced I should have searched harder and done more research before bothering you all.
Please consider this question ticket closed.
Pardon my slack response, work is kicking my bum. Tired.

I love these forums (:
Thanks again everybody!

[Member PPC]

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Partly off topic:

Untested script to turn of touchpad is a mouse is plugged in and turn it back on once it’s unplugged (inspired by this thread and https://askubuntu.com/questions/819300/bash-how-to-look-for-a-mouse-in-bash:

#!/usr/bin/env bash
declare -i ID
ID=<code>xinput list | grep -Eio '(touchpad|glidepoint)\s*id\=[0-9]{1,2}' | grep -Eo '[0-9]{1,2}'</code>

if [ -n "$(ls /dev/input/by-id/*mouse 2>/dev/null | grep -i 'usb\|PS\|COM')" ]
then echo "antiX found a mouse, disabling touchpad"
 xinput disable $ID
else 
 echo "No mice around, trying to enable touchpad"
 xinput enable $ID
fi

[Member marcelocripe]

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Hello techore and PPC.

Which of the two programs to disable the touchpad can we implement the translation features and still create a .desktop file?

– – – – –

Olá techore e PPC.

Qual dos dois programas para desativar o touchpad nós podemos implementar os recursos de tradução e ainda criamos um arquivo .desktop?

[Member techore]

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spaz wrote:

I’m now also mostly convinced I should have searched harder and done more research before bothering you all.

There is no hard rule on how long to hunt and the right search criteria. If you make an effort and get stuck, ask for help. We are a community and we are here to help.

@spaz, great question and topic!

[Member techore]

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marcelocripe wrote:

Hello techore and PPC.

Which of the two programs to disable the touchpad can we implement the translation features and still create a .desktop file?

I (would) use both. They serve two different uses, really. For example, I will disable the touchpad with or without a mouse. On the script to disable the touchpad when using a mouse, it should be an option not enabled by default so to avoid confusing new users.

A third touchpad feature to consider is disabling the touchpad when typing for X seconds to avoid palm selection and accidental deletion. Another item, on my “To do” list.

[Member techore]

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PPC wrote:

Untested script to turn of touchpad is a mouse is plugged in and turn it back on

Nice! I’ll give this a test. Thank you, @PPC.

[Moderator caprea]

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techore wrote:

to consider is disabling the touchpad when typing for X seconds

it’s easily done with syndaemon

#!/bin/bash
#turns off touchpad while typing#
syndaemon -i 3 -d

It’s also enough to put this into /.desktop-session/startup file to get the touchpad disabled while typing.
syndaemon -i 3 -d

[Member techore]

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@caprea, not all touchpads are synaptic. Does your script work for non-synaptic touchpads? I don’t even have xf86-input-synaptics installed.

[Moderator caprea]

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syndaemon is part of xserver-xorg-input-synaptics, which is installed by default on antix base/full.

You are using core.Of course, this is a completely different game.

[Member marcelocripe]

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I (would) use both. They serve two different uses, really.

I haven’t been able to test your script yet. But if I understood correctly, when it runs it disables the touchpad, when it runs again it turns the touchpad on. This is the best case scenario as the user chooses when to disable or enable the touchpad.

The phrases to be translated are these ‘Device Enabled’, “Touchpad disabled.” and “Touchpad enabled.”? Which phrases will be displayed in the graphical interface?

Can they be given the double quotes and a dollar sign “$”, without damaging the programming code? For example:

$’Device Enabled’

echo $”Touchpad disabled.”

echo $”Touchpad enabled.”

A third touchpad feature to consider is disabling the touchpad when typing for X seconds to avoid palm selection and accidental deletion. Another item, on my “To do” list.

If this option is to be included in the script, it would be interesting to have this information in the graphical interface.

I hope Spaz doesn’t get upset that we use this thread to continue the details of the script.

– – – – –

I (would) use both. They serve two different uses, really.

Eu ainda não pude testar o seu script. Mas se eu consegui compreender corretamente, quando ele é executado desativa o touchpad, quando ele é executado novamente, ele ativa o touchpad. Este é o melhor cenário possível, pois o usuário escolhe quando desativar ou ativar o touchpad.

A frases para serem traduzidas são estas ‘Device Enabled’, “Touchpad disabled.” e “Touchpad enabled.”? Quais frases serão exibidas na interface gráfica?

Elas podem ser receber as aspas duplas e um sinal de cifrão “$”, sem danificar o código de programação? Por exemplo:

$’Device Enabled’

echo $”Touchpad disabled.”

echo $”Touchpad enabled.”

A third touchpad feature to consider is disabling the touchpad when typing for X seconds to avoid palm selection and accidental deletion. Another item, on my “To do” list.

Se esta opção for entrar no script, seria interessante que houvesse esta informação na interface gráfica.

Eu espero que o Spaz não fique chateado de utilizarmos este tópico para darmos continuidade aos detalhes do script.

[Member techore]

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marcelocripe wrote:

The phrases to be translated are these ‘Device Enabled’, “Touchpad disabled.” and “Touchpad enabled.”?

I don’t know if you can translate “Device Enabled” for it comes from xinput. I have no idea what the output is for non-English systems. Easy enough to test.

I did a quick test for the Touchpad enabled/disabled.

$ TOUCHPAD_en="Touchpad"
$ TOUCHPADSTATE_en="Enabled"
$ notify-send "$TOUCHPAD_en $TOUCHPADSTATE_en" -t 3000

On execution, dunst notifies, so it does work.

• This reply was modified 2 months, 3 weeks ago by techore.

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