Quick question about mouse scroll wheel and xorg.conf fie

[Marius Gedminas]

Hello,

On Wed, Oct 13, 2010 at 01:36:16PM -0500, Anthony Papillion wrote:
> Been Googling for an hour and not able to figure this out.  I have a
> Logitech optical mouse that has a scroll wheel.  The mouse works well
> but the scroll wheel doesn't.

That is very strange.  Is it a USB mouse?  Do you see any output if you
run xev in a terminal, move the mouse cursor over the xev window, and
scroll the wheel?  You should see ButtonPress and ButtonRelease events
for buttons 4 and 5.

> The solutions I'm seeing say I need to
> edit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file to enable scroll wheel support (why
> isn't it enabled by default??)

It *is* enabled by default, and has been for *years*.  How old are those
guides you're reading?

> Someone said that modern X doesn't require a conf file because it
> detects everything automatically but IF there IS a conf file, it will
> use it. Is that true?

Yes.

> If so, can I just create a basic xorg.conf file
> in the /etc/X11 directory and paste in the lines to enable my scroll
> wheel?

First try to find out why your scroll wheel isn't working.  Attaching
your /var/log/Xorg.0.log file might help us guess why X doesn't detect
your mouse has a scroll wheel.  E.g. over here I see

[   169.009] (II) config/udev: Adding input device Logitech USB Receiver (/dev/input/event8)
[   169.020] (II) Logitech USB Receiver: Found 20 mouse buttons
[   169.020] (II) Logitech USB Receiver: Found scroll wheel(s)
[   169.020] (II) Logitech USB Receiver: Found relative axes
[   169.020] (II) Logitech USB Receiver: Found x and y relative axes
[   169.020] (II) Logitech USB Receiver: Configuring as mouse
[   169.020] (**) Logitech USB Receiver: YAxisMapping: buttons 4 and 5

when I plug in my USB mouse.

Marius Gedminas
-- 
Bumper sticker: Alcohol and calculus don't mix.  Never drink and derive.
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