Trackpad doesn't produce mouse clicks when tapped

[gnu]

I don't know whether it's hardware or software -- or a deliberate design choice versus a defect that got lost among all the other touchpad troubles.

I've gotten used to touchpads on my laptops that let you tap the touchpad to generate a left-mouse-click. This means you can not only drag the mouse around, but also do 90% of your clicking, without your index finger leaving the pad. For human interface it's a win. (It's also close to the expected user interface for touchscreens, if and when we make one.) I tried it on XO and it doesn't work.

B2, FW Q2B61, Build 239, S/N SHF 706001D5.

[jg]

No, until recently, we haven't had a stable enough touch pad/driver to see if we could implement this.

I'll do some experiments to see if it looks feasible.

[kimquirk]

There are many mousepads that don't produce clicks... like my MacBookPro. Not sure this is a requested feature.

I recommend we wait on this feature until there is feedback from the field or another feature, which is user-settable preferences.

[warp]

I have a feeling that this is more likely to be a Gen-2 issue, as the current touchpads simply don't offer the range of pressure sensing needed to do this by anything other then timing.

Specificly, normal touching pressure generally maxes out the pressure sensor, making it hard to tell brief firm taps from other things.

There are some things we could try, purely timing related testing, requiring a firm tap or a tap by fingernail and detecting based on a very brief switch to PT mode (a very firm push, or a touch with the fingernail, may trigger this reliable enough, though we wouldn't have dragging at all), that sort of thing.

Aside from the PT switch detection, this is all in xf86-input-evdev programming wise, but I simply don't see a good reliable way to do it right now.

Suggestions would be welcome.

[ixo]

On current (joyride 1702) MP XO Laptops, the touchpad has the ability to sense when I touch with two fingers... and alternatively tap them. So likely, it could be implemented with latest equipment.

FYI, this is the number one question, when anyone else uses my laptop. "What doesn't the double-tap work for a mouse click?" I answer: "It's by design"

[rsmith]

Feature is enabled by default on CL1A laptops. (Thats a Gen 1 with the synaptics touchopad) and feedback from the field is that its a misfeature. Will be disabled in Gen 1.5 at some point.