Comment 9 for bug 659793

Hi, I am not Oliver Breuer, but this bug is definitely still there in package:

xserver-xorg Version: 1:7.7+1ubuntu7
(xserver-xorg-core Version: 2:1.14.5-1ubuntu2)
(xserver-xephyr Version: 2:1.14.5-1ubuntu2)

The package autoconfiguration does somehow not work and omits the evdev functionality for the kdrive xserver contained in this Ubuntu package (likely also in the Debian package).

However, when manually compiling with ./configure --enable-kdrive --enable-kdrive-evdev --enable-kdrive-mouse --enable-kdrive-kbd, the compiled Xephyr binary (hw/kdrive/ephyr/Xephyr or build-main/hw/kdrive/ephyr/Xephyr in the build tree) does work as expected with evdev enabled.

Therefore, the workaround for people who want the xorg-server (xserver-xephyr binary package) with support for evdev enabled, I recommend compiling manually with the above mentioned configure options manually added to debian/rules.
(It seems compiling with DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=--enable-kdrive-evdev etc. is not supported).

For a quick fix under Ubuntu Saucy (with newest Xserver from saucy-updates repository enabled) or Ubuntu Trusty alpha, I included a patch.

The package can be compiled the Debian way:

mkdir -p ~/src/xorg-server-evdev-patch
cd ~/src/xorg-server-evdev-patch
wget #(URL to patch)
apt-get source xorg-server
cd xorg-server-1.14.5 #(or the corresponding package version)
patch -p1 < ../xorg-server-1.14.5-patch-kdrive-evdev
(optional: change package version in debian/changelog not to have the package replaced during later upgrades)
dpkg-buildpackage -uc -us -b
sudo dpkg -i ../xserver-xephyr_1.14.5-1ubuntu2_amd64.deb ../xserver-common_1.14.5-1ubuntu2_all.deb

If someone understands the build system used in xorg-server package better than me, please feel free to fix the bug in the build system's configure script (autodetection does not work, it seems).