[HN Gopher] Linux touchpad: preliminary project funding, survey ...
___________________________________________________________________
Linux touchpad: preliminary project funding, survey results
Author : wbharding
Score : 181 points
Date : 2020-05-19 15:03 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (bill.harding.blog)
(TXT) w3m dump (bill.harding.blog)
| fortran77 wrote:
| No multitouch!?
| boudin wrote:
| Yeah, didn't get that. Multitouch is definitely there. Not all
| gestures though.
| skykooler wrote:
| It very much depends on what hardware you have currently.
| rcthompson wrote:
| I'm a little unclear on how close to the funding goal this is. As
| far as I can tell, the goal is $10k total, but the current
| funding level shown is per month. Does it just mean that work
| can't begin until the accrued balance reaches $10k?
|
| Also, is there a way to make a one-time donation rather than an
| ongoing monthly pledge?
| sandov wrote:
| As a touchpad-ignorant person (I have not used Macbook touchpad,
| so I don't know what I'm missing) Linux touchpad support had
| always seemed fine to me until distros started using libinput by
| default.
|
| Last time I tried libinput, I couldn't disable acceleration on
| touchpads. "Flat" acceleration profile still had acceleration.
| odiroot wrote:
| My god. I hope Ubuntu is not going to jump on this quickly. My
| current setup with Synaptics and just two manual tweaks is
| perfect for me.
|
| The way MacBook touchpads work always irked me, always felt off.
| But maybe it's necessary for MacBooks with their enormous tachpad
| surfaces.
| bubblethink wrote:
| I just hope that libinput matches the xorg synaptics driver
| before it is deprecated. On every major OS release, I try the
| live cd to check if the touchpad with libinput is on par with
| synaptics, but it isn't there yet.
| floatboth wrote:
| libinput has been far ahead of xorg synaptics since forever.
| _ZeD_ wrote:
| So am I the only one that really _hate_ multitouch.
|
| The really thing I want is * left click on the left side of the
| touchpad * right click on the right side of the touchpad * right
| and bottom area to scroll (with ONE DAMN FINGER)
| seph-reed wrote:
| Of course not. But as much as you hate it, I love it, and it
| turns out most of the work needed to have things our own way is
| shared.
|
| As a person who just wants the MacOs experience, I'll gladly
| support the fact that you should be able to make it work the
| way you want too.
| squid_demon wrote:
| Will Linux fix their mouse support as part of this project?
| nitrogen wrote:
| Came here to say the same thing. Every Linux distro release the
| mouse finds a new way to break -- different acceleration
| profile, impossibly slow followed by impossibly fast, etc. --
| and I have to update my _fix_mouse.sh_ autorun script to scan
| for whatever the new _xinput_ parameter names are.
|
| It's unfortunately distressingly common in software, but
| especially Linux GUIs, to fix one thing by breaking three
| others instead of identifying a better framework to fix the
| root cause. The Linux kernel does seem to be good at that last
| part, but not the desktop projects.
| techntoke wrote:
| Never had an issue before. What distro and window manager are
| you using? I'm running Arch with Sway and no issues
| whatsoever with the mouse.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > The Linux kernel does seem to be good at that last part,
| but not the desktop projects.
|
| That's because there are a shitload of them, there's way more
| than just the big players KDE and Gnome. Then the stack is
| highly complex with technology in the mix that is _decades_
| old (X11 dates back to 1987, that stuff is older than me!),
| and political infighting between competing (corporate or
| personal) interests doesn 't help this either.
|
| Android has multitouch solved, but at the cost of building
| everything from scratch and lots of stuff still being kept in
| proprietary firmware blobs for touch controllers. And there
| is only one Android stack, not two dozen...
| pmontra wrote:
| I've been using Ubuntu since 2009, two HP laptops and zero
| problems with the touchpad. I used the first one with Windows for
| two years and the touchpad behaved better with Ubuntu than with
| Windows. I think the improvement was two finger scrolling instead
| of sliding on the right edge. I used only Ubuntu on the second
| laptop so I can't do any comparison but I never felt anything
| wrong with the touchpad. HP nc8430 and ZBook 15 first gen.
| myself248 wrote:
| This is still the most frustrating thing about Linux for me. I
| have two Thinkpads, a T460 running Windows from my employer, and
| a T560 running Ubuntu as my personal. Their touchpad hardware is,
| of course, identical. The experiences couldn't be more different.
|
| When I first got the machine, I spent weeks fighting with the
| driver, trying to figure out how a single number can represent
| four lines on two dimensions to define a region where palm-touch
| should be ignored. I still haven't gotten pointer precision where
| I'd like it; I simply know that getting within ten pixels is the
| best I can hope for without infuriatingly slow rocking and
| coaxing my finger around. It's disappointing to say the least.
|
| Honestly what I'd like most, is a WINE-like shim to simply let me
| run the Windows driver in some sort of sandbox and take its
| mouse-events to the Linux input system. Synaptics has clearly
| done the work to make the thing behave the way I'd like, and it
| would be the coolest thing if identical settings were equivalent
| and portable between machines.
| tadfisher wrote:
| After using a Steam Controller for a couple of years, I would
| love to use its trackball-emulation feature with my laptop
| touchpad. Would anyone else like to see this feature experimented
| with?
| ZeroCool2u wrote:
| As one of the people that said I'd donate to this cause and setup
| my first GitHub sponsorship for this project, I'm very excited!
| phoe-krk wrote:
| > _There 's currently a gaping chasm between the 35 sponsors who
| have supported the project on GitHub so far (thank you!!!) and
| the 309 poll respondents who indicated they would donate to this
| cause._
| wegs wrote:
| Well, let me put it this way. I would donate $250 to fix it. I
| think that's how much working support for touch, trackpad, and
| pen input would be worth it to me.
|
| I would donate $0 for a stranger on the internet to try to fix
| it themselves.
|
| I would donate $0 and advise others not to donate with an
| approach where there isn't even a developer driving this
| themselves ("Give us money, and we'll hire someone to fix it"
| approach), especially with the claimed problem, solution, and
| approaches.
|
| With open source, it's easy to find people to do the fun,
| modular bits (acceleration curves, palm rejection, etc.). It's
| hard to find people to do the plumbing and the not-fun bits. If
| OP were to create a pipeline which:
|
| * Supported the broad range of trackpads, tablets, styluses,
| etc. on the market
|
| * Did this with clean abstractions and modular drivers (NOT
| wrappers around wrappers around wrappers of what other people
| have written, but the painful work of refactoring other
| people's code)
|
| * Integrated with the desktop properly, potentially extending
| existing standards if necessary (NOT tried to replace the
| desktop with yet another standard no one supports)
|
| * Handled the odd-ball cases (a touchscreen, a drawing tablet,
| a drawing display, AND a plain old monitor are plugged into a
| box. What happens?)
|
| * Provided clean, simple, documented, pluggable APIs where
| people could tinker around with the fun stuff (anyone can make
| a new algorithm in Python and see it work in 5 minutes)
|
| That would solve the problem.
|
| For reference, their approach: "(1) evaluate which multi-touch
| features can be implemented with the least work 2) start to
| quantify the current nature of palm detection 3) measure how
| the acceleration curve of Linux touchpad compares to that of
| macOS. I have some ideas on how we might calibrate the
| acceleration curve to better match macOS, but it would be handy
| if anyone else has bright ideas on how they would attempt to
| quantify the touchpad acceleration curve on macOS (such that we
| can seek to match it here)."
|
| I could be wrong about all of this, but that's what it would
| take for ME to donate. I guess the other approach is to
| accomplish something yourself and establish a track record. I
| WILL instead donate to DIGImend, where a lone developer seems
| to heroically be successfully bringing tablet support to Linux.
| That's an example of a track record.
|
| https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?c=930980
| https://liberapay.com/spbnick/donate
| https://www.buymeacoffee.com/spbnick
|
| I'm sure this will go -5, since most critical posts do, but I
| find critical feedback to be more important than positivisty.
|
| edit: Just donated to DIGImend.
| WesolyKubeczek wrote:
| > With open source, it's easy to find people to do the fun,
| modular bits (acceleration curves, palm rejection, etc.).
|
| If that were true, there wouldn't be crowds of people telling
| that palm rejection in Linux sucks balls. Seriously.
|
| As someone who did dabble in libinput for my own needs, I
| probably qualify to tell you where exactly you can shove your
| $250 and your condescending ignorant attitude, and how deep
| you can shove it, too, along with the horse you rode in on.
| wegs wrote:
| >> With open source, it's easy to find people to do the
| fun, modular bits (acceleration curves, palm rejection,
| etc.).
|
| > If that were true, there wouldn't be crowds of people
| telling that palm rejection in Linux sucks balls
|
| Reading comprehension. Or intentionally selective
| misquoting. I'm not sure which one.
|
| I said: "Provided clean, simple, documented, pluggable APIs
| where people could tinker around with the fun stuff (anyone
| can make a new algorithm in Python and see it work in 5
| minutes)"
|
| Point me to that, and I'll eat my words. My claim is that
| __IF __you provide all the plumbing and infrastructure,
| people will do the fun stuff. Plumbing isn 't fun, though.
|
| In either case, I don't think an inability to read
| "qualifies [you] to tell [me] where exactly [I] can shove
| [my] $250 and [my] condescending ignorant attitude, and how
| deep [I] can shove it, too, along with the horse [I] rode
| in on." It qualifies you for remedial third-grade reading
| classes. :) I highly recommend them.
|
| I think I'm perfectly qualified to decide where to spend my
| own money, and it just went to DIGImend.
| saagarjha wrote:
| > I have some ideas on how we might calibrate the
| acceleration curve to better match macOS, but it would be
| handy if anyone else has bright ideas on how they would
| attempt to quantify the touchpad acceleration curve on macOS
|
| Reverse engineer the drivers and platform frameworks?
| zozbot234 wrote:
| > If OP were to create a pipeline which: ... That would solve
| the problem.
|
| The libinput project and pipeline was developed as a way of
| pursuing these goals, but it doesn't even have all the
| features of the legacy synaptics driver. It's not hard to see
| where the work should be going: start with bringing libinput
| up to feature parity (and fork the project if maintainers
| won't accept your changes upstream), then go further from
| there.
| [deleted]
| cycloptic wrote:
| Forking libinput is unwise and would likely not be
| productive choice. The maintainer of libinput and the
| synaptics driver are the same person, and he has blogged
| several times about why the synaptics driver was a mess and
| was impossible to test and maintain.
| https://who-t.blogspot.com/2016/04/why-libinput-doesnt-
| have-...
| zozbot234 wrote:
| First of all, whether a "hardware database" is a better
| place for a device-specific option than a "config file"
| is just semantics; what actually matters is that
| supporting device-specific quirks should be
| straightforward for the end-user. As for user-facing
| options, if the maintainer thinks they are 'too
| expensive' to maintain in the code, that means the
| existing architecture of that code is misguided and
| should be refactored.
| cycloptic wrote:
| It was already refactored, into libinput. The issue with
| testability is not about the code being badly
| architected. The fact is if you have 100 config options
| and 1000 supported hardware devices, you must test all
| possible options and now your test matrix has something
| on the order of 2 ^ 100 * 1000 cases to go through. This
| combinatorial explosion is unsustainable.
|
| I personally disagree that device quirks should be
| straightforward for the end-user. The end-user shouldn't
| even care about this, the point is to make it so they
| don't have to mess with config files or a hardware
| database at all.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| > The end-user shouldn't even care about this
|
| They may want to care because not every device will be in
| the hw database at the outset. Or the existing
| description may be incomplete, and fail to account for
| something that libinput supports. Good hardware support
| starts from users "scratching their own itch" by
| experimenting with "advanced", less-strictly-supported
| options to reach the best combination for _their_
| hardware, and perhaps their niche use cases. Testability
| is a red herring because only a few advanced options will
| ever be applicable; the issue is that they 're
| _different_ options for different cases.
| cycloptic wrote:
| It's not a red herring. Those advanced options still need
| to be tested and maintained. If no one tests and
| maintains those options, they will break and users will
| complain again and you're right back where you started.
| The idea is that it's better to just remove them instead
| of creating a false expectation that they're going to
| work. I personally would agree with that decision, at
| least in this case anyway.
|
| In libinput, people who understand the problem and are
| willing to work with the developers and contribute
| upstream can edit the hardware quirks. The maintainer has
| also blogged about this:
| https://who-t.blogspot.com/2018/06/libinput-and-its-
| device-q...
| nanna wrote:
| For me the problem is that the minimum of $5 per month is just
| too much. I would like to see this work done, but not for $60 a
| year (plus fees?). I fall into the category of being alright
| with the state of my trackpad, so $60 is just more than I will
| give.
|
| Edit: I'd gladly donate $2 or $3 per month.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| Damn, for $60 you can get one bangin' mouse to carry with you
| and problem solved.
| nanna wrote:
| Maybe so, but there'd still be so many problems left! And
| they need money too.
| robrtsql wrote:
| I can't use a mouse on my lap, though.
| raybb wrote:
| Link to donate: https://github.com/sponsors/gitclear
| Jnr wrote:
| But who is that guy and how would the money be used? From his
| profile it doesn't seem like he is a Linux developer.
| seltzered_ wrote:
| I'm someone who's highly interested in this and am not a
| linux developer either. He's been trying to evangelize this
| effort for years.
|
| Not everyone has to be a developer - some of us may see
| better roles as funders, testers, project managers, etc.
| dastx wrote:
| He's not, but he's going to hire a developer who can
| develop this. The full donation will go to said developer.
| coldpie wrote:
| Ahh, the ol' conversion funnel. Applies any time you want to
| separate someone from their money.
| BiteCode_dev wrote:
| I answered the poll, and said I would pay $50 for this, but
| never received any follow up (and I think I provided my email,
| I usually do in polls if they give the option).
|
| Now I just realized that there is a github sponsor link, but
| it's recurring. I don't want recurring. I want to send $50
| once.
| rkangel wrote:
| I am in exactly the same position. Happy to donate $100 once,
| but mot happy to sign up to a recurring subscription.
| forbiddenlake wrote:
| You can sign up, pay once, then cancel.
| grawprog wrote:
| Why should the onus be on me to make sure I don't pay more
| money than I want? I can't stand this 'just subscribe then
| cancel' mentality. I would like the option for a one time
| payment for things without having to fuck around starting
| and cancelling subscriptions. It's just ridiculous.
| GoOnThenDoTell wrote:
| So many companies made unsubscribing too hard that I
| wouldn't even try it with github.
| kelnos wrote:
| I just did this, and it's very easy. After you cancel, GH
| even puts up a multiple-choice "why did you cancel?"
| survey, and one of the options is "wanted to make a one-
| time donation".
| saagarjha wrote:
| Perhaps they should make that an official option at that
| point...
| trombonechamp wrote:
| The poll respondents did not indicate they would be willing to
| donate to the cause. They indicated they would be willing to
| donate to "fix it". There is a very big difference between
| paying to fix a problem and paying for a stranger to work on a
| project that may end up fixing the problem one day.
| BiteCode_dev wrote:
| Honestly at this point I wouldn't care. Give me a kickstarter
| link with a the poll author as the champion, and I would
| insta send money.
|
| I can afford a few bucks to help somebody to attempt to solve
| the problem. I'm even ok with failure as long as it's an
| honest attempt.
| renewiltord wrote:
| I think a successful way to do this is Neovim's
| BountySource which was perfectly run, imho. There was a "if
| it hits $x tarruda will work on it" thing which is all I
| wanted.
| viseztrance wrote:
| I can hardly tell the difference between my razer stealth linux
| touchpad and my workprovided macbook.
|
| Even based on the feedback, it seems that most people are okay
| with their touchpad experience and are more interested in
| advanced features like multitouch.
|
| Having this said, for myself this is a tough sell. I'm concerned
| that I would donate and I won't be able to tell the difference
| between this and some placebo drivers.
| WalterGR wrote:
| _I can hardly tell the difference between my razer stealth
| linux touchpad and my workprovided macbook._
|
| How much of the surface of the Linux touchpad is clickable?
| I.e. how much of it depresses when you press on it, vs. the
| MacBook?
|
| I've never seen a non-Apple touchpad that didn't have a big
| dead zone in the back (closest to the display) 1/4 to 1/3 of
| the surface.
| abrowne wrote:
| Do you click with your "aiming" finger? I usually have tap-
| to-click turned on and do tap that way, but on any touchpad,
| MacBooks primarily until recently, I always click with my
| thumb on the bottom quarter, where older touchpads had a
| separate button. Is this only because I started on those old-
| style touchpads?
| abhorrence wrote:
| I started on trackpads with the separate buttons, but now
| click with my index finger. I've found that the longer I've
| used the MacBook touch pads (and especially since they went
| fully non-mechanical) the more I dislike other touch pads.
| ubercow13 wrote:
| That's a physical limitation because the touchpad hinges from
| the back. No new touchpad driver is going to fix that.
| duskwuff wrote:
| And the Apple touchpad doesn't hinge at all! The "click"
| reaction you get when you press it is simulated by a set of
| force sensors and an actuator that vibrates the trackpad to
| simulate a click.
| dsego wrote:
| Apple trackpads used to hinge 10 years ago.
| saagarjha wrote:
| Actually, they used to sell a trackpad that did that
| until last year!
| chacha2 wrote:
| iPad pro still does.
| viseztrance wrote:
| Well, I'm using tap to click which is what I prefer.
|
| On the macbook pro I'm using clicks because tapping doesn't
| work as well as reliably, for example tap and drag.
|
| Later edit - I tried comparing the clickable area, and
| indeed, the upper region is not clickable on my razer (TIL).
| I realized this only just now, because this not how I usually
| use touchpads.
| wiml wrote:
| Testing my (several years old) XPS 13, perhaps the back 1/4
| is noticeably harder to click than the rest, and the very
| back 5-7 mm is unclickable.
|
| I have to say I've never noticed that before. I always use
| tap-to-click (whether on macs or non-macs) and most of the
| time I click using the front 1/2 of the pad anyway. If I
| weren't using tap-to-click the dead zone would probably
| bother me though.
| horsawlarway wrote:
| I'm in exactly the same spot with a (reasonably old 2017 model)
| Dell XPS.
|
| Wayland with libinput has been a JOY to use compared to
| basically anything I've used in linux before.
|
| I tried running an X based DE about 2 years ago on this machine
| and actually went back to running it in a VM in windows
| _because_ the touchpad felt so shoddy.
|
| No problems at all with the current setup. Can barely tell the
| different between my work Mac and the XPS.
|
| From my view, this whole issue is resolved.
| CoolGuySteve wrote:
| Yeah I don't have a problem with either my Asus Zenbook or my
| HP Envy.
|
| Reading through the comments it sounds like the real problem
| is Thinkpad trackpads suck for whatever reason and this is
| somehow getting extrapolated to "Linux trackpads suck".
| michaelmrose wrote:
| What is the difference between wayland + libinput and X +
| libinput precisely?
| tams wrote:
| What environment and config produces that result for you? I can
| definitely tell the difference under KDE, libinput and good old
| X.
| blendergeek wrote:
| Honestly, I hate the Apple touchpad experience. I love Linux
| touchpad experience, except for when there are multiple drivers
| available and depending on which one is being used, my settings
| change.
|
| Oh, and, 'tap to click' should be default.
| ThePowerOfFuet wrote:
| >I hate the Apple touchpad experience
|
| You're definitely in the minority on that.
|
| > Oh, and, 'tap to click' should be default.
|
| Okay, now you're just trolling.
| gertrunde wrote:
| I'm faintly curious, how does the MacOS "Touchpad Experience"
| referenced in question #1 differ from the Windows one? (Or any
| other OS?)
|
| (Background to my ignorance: While I do (very) occasionaly use
| MacOS, I usually default to the terminal as it's more familiar...
| and probably spend most (60-70%) of my time connected to linux or
| unix-like systems via cli/ssh... from a Windows system.)
|
| Are we talking touch gestures or something? Or multi-finger
| things? Are they really that massively different? Surely a
| touchpad is a touchpad? (Not counting those awful things without
| proper buttons).
| aloer wrote:
| much much much better:
|
| - super smooth. Scrolling and everything just feels right. They
| do a lot of low level software magic to make that happen. Off
| topic: If you ever try to reimplement a scroll view on iOS you
| will see how much effort is needed to make it smooth - even if
| you have access to all the same APIs
|
| - biiiig trackpad. I find this especially important when I have
| a big external monitor plugged in. I can easily move the mouse
| across two screens without lifting the finger. And very good
| palm recognition to avoid accidental presses
|
| - the haptic feedback is amazing. The entire surface is stiff
| and the feeling of a button click is done entirely in software
| + haptic feedback. Once you are used to it every other trackpad
| just feels old and cheap (same with iPhones and taptic engine
| actually)
|
| - Gestures and what you can do with them (OS X spaces!) is
| really well done. On many other systems a gesture will only
| work via on/off states. On Mac you have continuous gestures
| (you can undo/go back at any point) and that makes a big
| difference in terms of how fluid and smooth interactions will
| feel
| saagarjha wrote:
| I've done some reverse engineering of the macOS Spaces
| implementation and it is really all the way through the
| stack; Dock creates animation transactions and everything in
| WindowServer to make it work. You really need deep
| integration to have something like that be smooth and work
| well.
| floatboth wrote:
| > Gestures and what you can do with them (OS X spaces!) is
| really well done
|
| GNOME 3 does this correctly (but spaces are vertical), I
| think KDE Plasma too, and I have personally implemented this
| gesture in Wayfire :)
| fearface wrote:
| The touchpad on my Lenovo X1 Extreme has a noticable delay
| (maybe 300ms) of when it starts working after I used the
| keyboard. Instead of real palm detection, it gets into some
| kind of sleep mode.
| sethhochberg wrote:
| You'd think "surely a touchpad is a touchpad", but the reality
| for most heavy users is that Apple really does have an
| experience substantially better than most in this area.
|
| Large tracking surface. No dead zones, which can't be touched
| or tapped. Fantastic palm rejection. Gestures that work
| reliably, and never over or under-detect fingers.
|
| Its not really to say that the Apple trackpads are better at
| their best than the other vendors, as much as it is that the
| other vendors often behave in unpredictable ways. I used to
| have a Thinkpad which worked every bit as well as my current
| Macbook trackpad when it worked right, but which would
| frequently fail to recognize a finger during a scrolling
| gesture, couldn't be clicked on the portion closest to the
| keyboard, and occasionally the palm rejection just wouldn't
| work. The minor annoyances over time add up to a much more
| frustrating experience.
| aarmenaa wrote:
| I've noticed that two-finger scrolling, which should be one
| of the easiest things to get right, is wrong on basically
| anything that's not MacOS. Windows and Linux arbitrarily
| insist on 3-line scrolling in a lot of apps. Even when pixel
| scrolling is technically available, it works poorly. It
| appears small movements are ignored, and then once you've hit
| some sort of distance threshold the scroll "jumps" to
| register the whole movement. There's weird delays where you
| need to "un-touch" the pad before you can transition from
| moving the cursor to scrolling. The scroll gets "dropped"
| after a while even though I still have two fingers on the
| pad.
|
| I've seen all this across many laptops running Linux and
| Windows, including Macs, which leads me to believe that that
| the issue software.
| floatboth wrote:
| > Windows and Linux arbitrarily insist on 3-line scrolling
| in a lot of apps
|
| Yes, macOS is definitely more consistent in terms of UI
| toolkits, of course.
|
| Stick to GTK apps (with libinput on your system of course)
| and everything should be great :)
| ghostpepper wrote:
| Off topic but did anyone else notice that this entire blog post
| is actually hosted on a site called amplenote? With uMatrix
| enabled, the wordpress blog just shows an empty post with a
| broken iframe. Is this a common architecture? What's the purpose?
| bArray wrote:
| On my system the iframe is really small but the content is in
| there. I've seen a bunch of sites doing this recently and it's
| quite annoying.
| ghostpepper wrote:
| Just to be clear my settings deliberately block iframes by
| default until I allow them. I just thought it was odd that
| the whole Wordpress blog is literally window dressing.
| boudin wrote:
| My guess would be that it allows the author to push notes from
| his note taking software to his blog directly.
| bchociej wrote:
| Color me stunned that people are so dissatisfied with their
| touchpads in Linux. 0-3 lines of options in my config have made
| me perfectly content with every touchpad I've ever used in Linux.
| dmix wrote:
| Looks like the number of contributors have doubled since this
| post hit the frontpage.
|
| That's great, this is one of the few things left that held back
| Linux desktop, and it wasn't even that bad with some tweaking but
| it shouldn't need tweaking. Gnome has made drastic improvements
| in recent years as well.
|
| Now if only companies would fund proper open source graphics
| drivers then there would be no reason for developers to not use
| Linux. Otherwise you need to buy a laptop with Linux in mind and
| you'll be fine.
| peatmoss wrote:
| Re GPU: Running a desktop with a shiny new AMD 5700-xt, and it
| has been pretty excellent. Only nit to pick is that I had to
| add a small bit of configuration to enable FreeSync support
| with my monitor.
|
| Performance in various Steam games (native as well as emulated
| via Proton) has not been a disappointment.
|
| That said, previously had an NVidia card that worked okay with
| Ubuntu, but required enabling some proprietary drivers. It
| worked fine, but was an extra hoop to jump, and using
| proprietary drivers sticks in my craw.
|
| If I did anything on my desktop that relied on CUDA, I suspect
| I'd be stuck with using the proprietary NVidia drivers.
| wbharding wrote:
| This project is now up to 75 supporters and $800 monthly sponsor
| estimate, which should be a good enough starting point to start
| talking to devs. Thanks a bunch, HN!
| kevincox wrote:
| I've used a mac occasionally and there are really only two
| features I miss from the trackpad level: - Add a finger to click.
| This is very useful to be able to click without stopping dragging
| your finger. - The acceleration curve for pointing feels more
| natural. This was surprising to me because I use Linux primarily
| but I feel like I hit targets slightly more on MacOS.
|
| With libinput I have found that multi-touch gestures work really
| well we are just missing application support. It seems that this
| project doesn't aim to work on applications at all so for me it
| seems like they are barking up the wrong tree. For example I
| would love to have Firefox wired up to linux three-finger swipe
| gestures for forward/back (and I bind down -> Scroll To Top and
| up -> Close tab).
| [deleted]
| eth0up wrote:
| Perhaps the only thing other than a certain leviathan that I
| loathe in Linux, is the touchpad. I have butchered laptops as a
| result of touchpad induced madness. I've tried synclient and
| other tweaks to no sufferable avail. My present laptop has the
| touchpad removed by pliers. I used the term "madness" sincerely.
| I think the present situation might be eligible for a place in
| the wiki for Unethical Human Experimentation. Of course, Linux is
| not entirely to blame; the physical quality has declined
| immensely for most touch/clickpads.
|
| Perhaps someday I'll experience playing go without a mouse and
| risk of hypertension.
|
| I'm typically not one to use the term - but godspeed, in this
| case!
| edjrage wrote:
| If a touchpad does this much to you I'm sorry to inform you may
| have a more serious problem than the touchpad.
|
| Sleep, diet, exercise, and meditation.
| Answerawake wrote:
| For people that are highly invested in their work, the
| computer is more than just a tool, it is an extension of
| themselves as it is their link to their deep-seated passion.
| I feel for the author as I have had to deal with terrible
| technology hampering me at bad moments as well. I wonder what
| is preventing them from trying something like a Mac. I have
| three computers under my desk (Windows, Mac, and Linux) and I
| always find Mac to be the least bad experience(although all
| three are regressing in my opinion).
| edjrage wrote:
| But there are many alternatives. My suggestions are one
| such alternative. Getting a Mac is another. Or using a
| mouse. Or switching to a keyboard-only workflow. None of
| them need to involve killing yourself because a crappy
| touchpad driver is between you and your "deep-seated
| passion".
| ghostpepper wrote:
| I also spend many hours per day on the computer, both for
| work and leisure, and for this reason I have invested money
| and time finding high quality: chair, desk, monitors,
| headphones, mouse and keyboard.
|
| I understand that not everyone has the luxury of space for
| a full WFH setup but I can't imagine doing 8-10 hours per
| day with only a 14" laptop at the kitchen table. This is
| why, for me, a Mac quality trackpad experience on Linux is
| closer than a nice-to-have than a necessity.
| edjrage wrote:
| Interestingly I've been using a 12" laptop as my daily
| driver with a crappy chair, desk and earbuds and no
| monitor for over two years and I've had no cardiovascular
| problems so far. Stressed people are quick to blame their
| environment (tools and whatnot) but fail to take a hard
| look at themselves.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Age?
|
| :->
| edjrage wrote:
| Old enough to be mindful about the health consequences of
| worrying about the wrong things and not worrying about
| the right things.
| nitrogen wrote:
| Years ago when I had to switch from Linux to Mac for work,
| the different keyboard shortcuts for simple things like
| copy, paste, word left, move selection with cursor, etc.
| killed me. There are ways to change some of them, but
| Electron apps and various websites have hard coded
| emulations of the defaults.
|
| My coworkers simply refused to empathize with my
| frustration, but it's seriously like having a
| malfunctioning limb when a neurally deeply learned
| technology starts failing you.
|
| Imagine a nightmare where when you try to open your hand
| and it closes, you try to move your arm outward and it
| smacks you in the face, you try to look down and your eyes
| instead flail randomly, and your legs are moving in slow
| motion while the monster is hunting you down.
| jorvi wrote:
| Now imagine coming from years of Mac use to Linux or
| Windows, and discovering to your horror that because the
| modifier key on those platforms isn't cmd but ctrl you
| cannot do many of the default shortcuts you're used to in
| the terminal.
| Gracana wrote:
| Yep, Apple really nailed it with that choice. Not only
| can you use GUI key combos in the terminal, but also you
| can use terminal line editing key combos in the GUI.
| That's something that seems like it ought to be possible
| in Linux, but afaik it is not.
| reuben364 wrote:
| One thing one my wish list of things that will probably
| never happen is an extensible EMACs, Jupyter hybrid with
| a full on highly extensible dependently typed programming
| language. By keeping the specification of the components
| as abstract as possible, one could reinterpret the same
| code to give a completely different and customizable user
| experience. Probably with a lens based GUI toolkit for
| interactive widgets.
|
| I have no idea if it is possible, and maybe I should be
| the change I want to see in the world.
|
| EDIT: I realize now this doesn't quite follow the
| conversation, but I wanted to get the thought out
| somewhere.
| K0SM0S wrote:
| OK, I'll bite that sandwich.
|
| Can you expand some of these points? I fail to understand
| (I need an ELI5, first principles)
|
| I think I get the premise, EMACs/Jupyter hybrid with ext.
| prog. lang. (+1 for typed).
|
| > By keeping the specification of the components as
| abstract as possible, one could reinterpret the same code
| to give a completely different and customizable user
| experience.
|
| Custom UX is my pet peeve, has been forever since the
| 1990s. I have intuitions but no clear understanding of
| what you mean here. Does that essentially mean decoupling
| model/view, a more modular or stateless metaphor?
|
| > Probably with a lens based GUI toolkit for interactive
| widgets.
|
| lens? (impossibly hard for me to Google what that generic
| word refers to, I just tried)
|
| --------
|
| I'd like to 'get' to the essence of the paradigm you're
| suggesting. What the 'magic' is, its endgame, what it
| 'feels' or looks like.
| sitkack wrote:
| Says the guy using a Mac, the best touchpad within 5 parsecs.
| edjrage wrote:
| Actually such an aggressive response (from the GP, not you)
| is precisely the kind of thing I'd expect from someone who
| has an easy life. I live in pretty crappy conditions,
| including a crappy computer with crappy touchpad drivers. I
| just refuse to let such mundane things give me
| hypertension.
| sitkack wrote:
| I have an old X1 Carbon that I use at the grunge travel
| laptop, like throw it in the backpack in a paper bag and
| go for a hike level of grunge.
|
| Its trackpad is junk, phantom movements, zero palm
| rejection. I coded up some lock scripts so that it locks
| out the buttons if the cursor is moved. I fantasize about
| DeepTrack, the AGI that will finally give me trackpad
| bliss on a Linux desktop.
| eth0up wrote:
| Thanks for the psychoanalysis. Two of what you mentioned are
| inevitable. The exercise part is taken care of by the default
| settings which require multiple laps to impel the indolent
| pointer across the screen, and finally, I meditated deeply
| during the excision. See; you're a pretty astute therapist
| after all.
| Gaelan wrote:
| Thanks for the chuckle.
| the8472 wrote:
| > My present laptop has the touchpad removed by pliers.
|
| Under which circumstances is disabling it on a software level
| insufficient?
| eth0up wrote:
| An emotional one.
| LeifCarrotson wrote:
| My ThinkPad has two sets of buttons - one with a middle mouse
| button below the spacebar, and one with just left and right
| click below the trackpad that practically hangs off the bezel.
|
| Fortunately, the trackpad flex cable only connects to the
| bottom pair of buttons, so unplugging the flex cable is a
| completely non-destructive process that leaves the trackpoint
| and mouse buttons completely functional and makes my laptop
| somewhat secure against other people trying to use it! I will
| admit that this non-destructive method lacks the catharsis that
| pliers could provide.
| holyDictionary wrote:
| I've set easy keyboard shortcuts to enable/disable the
| touchpad, and that has been working for me. But I understand
| how you feel, the palm rejection is especially terrible, no
| matter how I try to tweak it.
| [deleted]
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2020-05-19 23:01 UTC)