KDE No middle mouse button simulation with two button mouse

[Philip Ashmore]

Binary package hint: kcontrol

lsb_release -d => Ubuntu 8.04.1
KDE 3.5.9

I would like to simulate a middle mouse button click with my two button synaptics touchpad but I can't.
I know the synaptics package is broken / non functional - I'm using it as a regular mouse, no tap zones, just the actual buttons.

I remember from using other distributions (e.g. Fedora) that there is/was an option to "emulate three buttons" with a two-button mouse by clicking on both of them.
If there is a way of configuring this, I can't find it.

[JM Williams (jmdwilliams)]

What does the file /etc/X11/xorg.conf say for the option Emulate3Buttons? To find out quickly, at a terminal enter:

    grep Emulate3Buttons /etc/X11/xorg.conf

If it does not say “true” (or “1”, “on” or “yes”), you could try changing this
setting by at a terminal entering:

    sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg

Accept the current answers until you reach the “Emulate 3 button mouse?”
question.

This is not a user-level option, which is presumably what you are looking for,
so I shall leave the status of this report alone for now.

[Philip Ashmore (contact-philipashmore)]

I tried
    sudo dpkg-reconfigure -p low xserver-xorg
and the question "Emulate 3 button mouse?" wasn't asked.

It's a shame it didn't feel the same way about my monitor and video card - it happily scrubbed driver-specific settings.

As a test I added
    Option "Emulate3Buttons" "1"
to the "Configured Mouse" and "SynapticsDevice" sections.

    dpkg-reconfigure -p low xserver-xorg

deleted both of them!

Just as well I kept a backup - thanks.

I will attach the resultion xorg.conf as well as my good configuration xorg.conf.good.

[Philip Ashmore (contact-philipashmore)]

Using my previous configuration with the Emulate3Buttons added allows me to copy text from the terminal window by pressing both mouse buttons simultaneously.
Pasting text is achieved by pressing both mouse buttons in e.g. kate.

Interestingly, this process seems to bypass the KDE clipboard which still holds it's contents and can be pasted by Ctrl-V.

[JM Williams (jmdwilliams)]

I’m sorry that you had problems with that command. The problem is presumably
that nvidia-xconfig wrote the previous version of the file. Perhaps there is
a bug in nvidia-xconfig that means it doesn’t write out the Emulate3Buttons
option. If so, then this might be considered to be a bug in that package.

Middle-clicking will often bypass the clipboard. Ubuntu (the X Window System,
to be more precise) has a “primary selection” as well as a clipboard. The
primary selection is filled whenever you select some text; the clipboard is
filled only when you choose copy. This means that you can use the primary
selection without affecting the clipboard, which can be useful. (If you
select some text and then copy it, you can either middle-click or paste!)