[TriLUG] Advice Please

[Ed Blackman via TriLUG]

On Fri, Feb 21, 2025 at 03:21:23PM +0000, Joseph Mack NA3T via TriLUG wrote:
> o I have a Dell laptop now. It's OK, but I dont need a wide screen (1440
> pixels) on a laptop and I'd rather have the smaller format of the Thinkpad
> (1024*768) and the smaller size of the laptop. As well the large built-in
> Dell mousepad, in the center of the keyboard area, is under my hands when I
> type and I have to manually turn it off (which I can only do after bootup)
> and use an external mouse, which negates the point of having a built-in
> mousepad. The only way you can type with the Dell mousepad on, is to hold
> your hands in the air. The Thinkpads had a small nubbin in the middle of the
> keyboard, for the mouse, which didn't get activated when you typed.

Sorry for the late reply, but I have a solution for Dell touchpads that I thought you might be interested in.  I too prefer to use whatever Dell calls its Trackpoint, and was frustrated to be touching the touchpad.

I created ~/.config/autostart/touchpad-disable.desktop with this content:
[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Name=Touchpad Disable
Comment=Disable laptop touchpad
Exec=sh -c 'xinput disable "$(xinput list --name-only | grep -i touchpad)"'

On boot, it lists the xinput devices, greps for the touchpad device, and passes it to "xinput disable".  Crude, but effective.

That only runs when have fully logged in for the first time, so I have to avoid the touchpad between reboot and full login, but it stays disabled until another reboot, which aren't frequent.

I hope that makes your Dell experience less frustrating!

-- 
Ed Blackman