Alps Touchpad on HP Pavillion Driver

[sushrutbhalla11]

Hi,

I am on an HP pavillion. I installed Ubuntu on it but I can't find the driver for my Alps touchpad. So everytime I type and my palm touches the trackpad, it selects the wrong window.
Here is the output of xinput
~$ xinput
⎡ Virtual core pointer id=2 [master pointer (3)]
⎜ ↳ Virtual core XTEST pointer id=4 [slave pointer (2)]
⎜ ↳ PS/2 Generic Mouse id=11 [slave pointer (2)]
⎣ Virtual core keyboard id=3 [master keyboard (2)]
↳ Virtual core XTEST keyboard id=5 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ Power Button id=6 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ Video Bus id=7 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ Power Button id=8 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ HP Truevision HD id=9 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ AT Translated Set 2 keyboard id=10 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ HP Wireless hotkeys id=12 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ HP WMI hotkeys id=13 [slave keyboard (3)]

I can't see any options for disabling touchpad in my system settings either.

I installed pmouse driver and restarted but no luck. I also installed pointing devices from the "Ubuntu Software Center" but it didn't have the option either.

Thank you.

[chopra]

I've got an HP pavilion too, and faced the exact same problem. Most laptops have a hot key to disable the touchpad where F5 is, but not HP.
Try this:

xinput set-prop "SynPS/2 Synaptics Touchpad" "Device Enabled" 0

To re-enable, just replace the 0 with a 1. This will not survive a reboot, or logging off and logging back on, unless you place it in your .bashrc file.


Chopra

[sushrutbhalla11]

Hello Chopra,

Thanks for your reply. But the issue is with Alps touchpad not with Synaptics Touchpad. Could you help me with the Alps touchpad??

Thanks

[chopra]

I've never used an alps touch pad, sorry. Maybe someone else here has. In the meantime, there is a temporary fix, perhaps. One rather unsophisticated option that worked for me in the past (if there are no hot keys to disable it) is to just take a thick piece of cardboard and tape it over the touchpad. I used a piece of cardboard from a box of chocholates. One from a legal pad isn't thick enough.

It's crude, but it works, and it won't stop you from closing your laptop.

Chopra