10.04 Lucid Touchpad only enabled at login

[spike_naples]

Hi guys, I was wondering about this problem. I happened to turn my touchpad off from the BIOS but now that I want to turn it on again from there I am unable to. i tried following the directions posted here but it still doesn't work.

I posted this in another forum topic too but I was wondering if it would fit in this thread as well.

I know there's a solution but I'm just not that well versed in Ubuntu Linux to find a workaround myself.

Hope someone could help me. Thanks in advance.

[m_kelly]

spike_naples, if you have turned off the touchpad from the BIOS, then your best (possibly only) solution is to turn it on from the BIOS. The fix that was posted will only work if the problem was the touchpad_enabled gconf key being set to false. It's kind of like trying to turn on a light with a light switch during a power outage; no matter how many times you flip the switch, it won't work until the the power outage has been fixed.

From a command line, try running:

gconftool-2 --get /desktop/gnome/peripherals/touchpad/touchpad_enabled

If it outputs "false", then you should try the fix. If the output is "true", then the change that the fix makes has already been made.

[spike_naples]

Thanks. I've turned it on and off from the BIOS several times but it just doesn't work anymore.

I'm thinking of reinstalling again though as I feel this is the only solution. Have that one problem about auto login too as it displays an error but this concern belongs to another thread.

Anyway, I appreciate all the help you guys do for noob users like myself. Don't get tired of us.

[pognonec]

The command indicated in an earlier post in this thread fixed it for me:

gconftool-2 --set --type boolean /desktop/gnome/peripherals/touchpad/touchpad_enabled true

If not done, could you mark your post as "Solved" to facilitate other people trying to fix the same problem?