Someone should develop a feature that...

[TheNessus]

Would make the mouse pointer disappear when the computer senses you are typing. i.e. when hitting letter keys continuously, and not special keys such as alt, which might use the pointer simultaneously. To be an optional feature, of course. This can do wonders for laptop users and put linux ahead of other OS's.

[Psumi]

Might want to fork unclutter and see if you can't make unclutter into smart-unclutter

or something.

[Psumi]

What I mean is, someone should fork unclutter so that the -keystroke option makes it so that it removes the mouse from ANYWHERE when typing (root doesn't work.)

[TheNessus]

Unclutter is nice but irrelevant. If you accidentally hit the mouse pad while typing, the pointer still pops right back and might wreak havoc on your work without you noticing.

[Psumi]

Unclutter is nice but irrelevant. If you accidentally hit the mouse pad while typing, the pointer still pops right back and might wreak havoc on your work without you noticing.

That's what happened on OS9 and below too. :|

[Random_Dude]

It's really not a bad idea, that happens to me all the time.

But the feature would have to be able to distinguish between typing and playing an FPS (for example). There are situations in which typing and pointing at the same time are important.

[3rdalbum]

Yeah, the classic Mac OS did this, and maybe OS X does it too. It's probably covered by an Apple patent.

[madjr]

install Touchfreeze

is in the software center

is the closest thing to what you want and probably halfway there on features. i installed it once, but am not sure if it works (not on a laptop right now), you could report the bug and get it working (could be the code or the packaging)

[bcbc]

Would make the mouse pointer disappear when the computer senses you are typing. i.e. when hitting letter keys continuously, and not special keys such as alt, which might use the pointer simultaneously. To be an optional feature, of course. This can do wonders for laptop users and put linux ahead of other OS's.

I think you mean 'catch up with other OS's'. Using XP, my synaptic touchpad has that option, as well as a feature to ignore 'palm touches', and a whole bunch of other stuff like mapping buttons to different regions of the pad.

Still it's probably not Linux's fault - it's the manufacturer not bothering to provide the drivers I guess. I went to their website and there's not a mention of Linux.

[Random_Dude]

If you go to System>Preferences>mouse>Touchpad, you have one option to disable the touchpad when you're typing.

[TheNessus]

install Touchfreeze

is in the software center

is the closest thing to what you want and probably halfway there on features. i installed it once, but am not sure if it works (not on a laptop right now), you could report the bug and get it working (could be the code or the packaging)

Does not seem to work on Kubuntu 9.10



I think you mean 'catch up with other OS's'. Using XP, my synaptic touchpad has that option, as well as a feature to ignore 'palm touches', and a whole bunch of other stuff like mapping buttons to different regions of the pad.

Still it's probably not Linux's fault - it's the manufacturer not bothering to provide the drivers I guess. I went to their website and there's not a mention of Linux.

Yes, I remember having this on Vista actually; quite advanced. Gnome had similar features. No such features on KDE though... :-\

[cariboo]

It works fine in Lucid UNE.

[Psumi]

Too bad touchfreeze is a KDE app though.

[forrestcupp]

It's really not a bad idea, that happens to me all the time.

But the feature would have to be able to distinguish between typing and playing an FPS (for example). There are situations in which typing and pointing at the same time are important.FPSs don't need the pointer to be shown on the screen. This type of thing wouldn't disable the mouse, it just would temporarily not show the pointer on the screen.


I think you mean 'catch up with other OS's'.
Exactly. Sometimes it's built into software. Word and Outlook are two apps that you would need that, and it is just built in to those programs.

[genterminl]

Psumi - I don't think touchfreeze is KDE specific. It looks like it should work with any desktop enviromnent/Window Manager that has a system tray (I suppose there are some standards to be followed.) I currently get a segfault under xfce, but I suspect htat is because I have not enabled SHM.

Also, you can use syndaemon (although it's command line, not gui) to disable the touchpad while you're typing.