Originally posted by: coolred
Well after my troubles with knoppix, gentoo and slackware, I took soem time off from linux. I just got my Novell/SUSE stuff from that free hot deal a while back, and figured I would give it a try. It seemed to install fine, minus the fact that my mouse never worked. Its an Intellimouse EXplorer Optical mouse, currently using the USB connection, which works fine in windows. I did notice when I plugged it into the PS2 port instead(with the adaptor obviously) that the mouse did power on, but still did not work, maybe it would have had I rebooted.
So I suppose you mean that when you plug your mouse into the USB port when using Linux it wouldn't light up?
That means that your USB stuff isn't being detected properly... What motherboard are you using, and what chipset is it?
....
first off if your in X and you unplug your mouse from the USB and plug it into the PS2 port, it probably won't automaticly recognize it. X initializes the mouse when it is started up.
So you can reboot, but it probably won't be nessicary unless your using a ancient ancient computer that can't handle mouse being "hot plugged" into the ps2 port (I have a 200mhz compaq that is like that.).
What you'd want to do is restart X. Hit ctrl-alt-f1 (or any F# button thru to F6) and login to the console as root, then issue this command:
telinit 3
then wait a bit then go
telinit 5
(that's using what is called "runlevels" different runlevels are designed to modify the standard opration of the computer. Runlevel 3 in Suse is "multiuser + network without X login", Runlevel 5 is "multiuser with network and X login", see your /etc/inittab file for different possible runlevels. Telinit tells your computer what runlevel to run at.)
and that will turn off X then turn it back on.
Another way to reset X is to simple hit ctrl-alt-backspace while in X.
Troubleshooting a non-working mouse:
Now if the PS2 is just not working period in X and X won't start because of this (it won't start without a working pointer device)
You can tell if your mouse is functional by doing a simple command.
but a little background:
The files in the /dev folder are mostly what is called "device files", they aren't actual files per say, but they are special because they treat system resources AS IF they were files. You mouse should respond to one of these files.
If you using a 2.6.x series kernel your generic mouse device would be /dev/input/mice, in a series 2.4.x kernel your mouse device for PS2 mice would be /dev/psaux.
Often you will have what is called a "symbolic link" (sort of like a shortcut, but in the filing system) called /dev/mouse pointed to whatever your mouse is, this is generally setup at installation time, but you can use the "ln" command to overwrite that link to make it point to whatever you want.
The second part of the command is the "cat" tool. This simply outputs the contents of files (most of the time used on text files, but it can be anything) to what is called "standard output" or stdout, which by default is your console/terminal/xterm/commandline (whatever your using to get a command line, basicly).
So the command would be:
cat /dev/input/mice
do that and then wiggle your mouse around, and it should output the mouse movement as gibberish. Hit ctrl-c to cancel the command. (it may leave your console all scrambled. don't worry about it; it's a bug. Log into a different console if that happens. If you can type commands, but not see anything, or everything is in ascii text, but something is funny try typing out the "stty sane" command and that will reset it most of the time).
So if your getting gibberish, then it's working. Or pretty close to working. And if X still won't start and complains about a missing mouse, then it's configuration for the pointer input device is simply wrong.
I use Debian with kernel 2.6.8.1 and I use a Microsoft intellemouse via the USB port.
You can check your config file (either /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 (could be /etc/X11/XF86Config, but if you have both then the one with the -4 is the "real" one.) or /etc/X11/xorg.conf, depending on wiether or not your using Xorg or XF86Config.)
My config for the mouse is as follows:
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Configured Mouse" #this changes from distro to distro
Driver "mouse"
Option "CorePointer"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection
See the main file for details...
"man 4x mouse"
Other possible "Protocol" Options are:
Auto, Microsoft, MouseSystems, MMSeries, Logitech, MouseMan, MMHitTab,
GlidePoint, IntelliMouse, ThinkingMouse, ValuMouseScroll, AceCad, PS/2,
ImPS/2, ExplorerPS/2, ThinkingMousePS/2, MouseManPlusPS/2, GlidePointPS/2,
NetMousePS/2, NetScrollPS/2, BusMouse, SysMouse, WSMouse, USB, Xqueue.
If your not sure just try Auto and it'll try to detect it automaticly.
But before I got to that, I had to check and make sure I didn't mess up my widnows stuff in any way. When I reboot, I got a boot loader, with 4 options. LInux, Windows 1, windows 2, and failsafe or something like that. First off I am not sure why there are 2 windows listings, but secondly and more importantly, neither one of them will boot into windows. I will have to try it again to get the exact message it gives, but from what i remember it said something like this:
(h2,0)FAT filesystem, somthing else?
chainloader +1
_
I don't remember if that is exactly what it said, but it was something liek that. The other options was basically the same only it said unknown filesystem and had a differant partition location, like(h3,0) or somthing like that. But that is where they both stopped. After telling the BIOS to boot off my windows drive, that allows me to boot into windows, which is working fine. I did attempt a reboot on linux, it appeared to boot fine, and got to the desktop(is it still called that in linux?) but again the mouse was still not working, but I forgot to try it in the PS2 port, so who knows. ANy help would be great.
The GUI in Linux is called "X windows". Your desktop is also called a desktop, but it's also called a "X server" (depending on what specificly you want to talk about) and all those programs like Mozilla or Gnome desktop applications are "X clients".
The cool part about X is that your "X clients" don't have to be on the same computer as your "X server" (which would be the computer with the keyboard and mouse and monitor you want to use the X clients on).
It's a bit backwards from normal Lan networking stuff, but it makes sense after a while. So that way I can have my desktop running Gnome from my harddrive, but be running evolution from my desktop to check my email OVER the internet! (X protocol is insecure, so I use SSH to "tunnel X" to my laptop thru the various networks that make up the internet). Sort of like VNC, but the actual program's input/output is trasported transparently over the internet (or more often my LAN (X is slow over slow internet connections)), so it becomes a integrated part of my desktop.
Is assume that your using "grub"
Grub is a interesting bootloader because it is so very advanced. But to fix your problem you need to edit your configuration file for grub.
It is usually located in /boot/grub and is either menu.lst or grub.conf (or often both thru a symbolic link, edit one you edit both).
Here is a sample configuration file from
here
# grub.conf generated by anaconda
#
# Note that you do not have to rerun grub after making changes to this file
# NOTICE: You have a /boot partition. This means that
# all kernel and initrd paths are relative to /boot/, eg.
# root (hd0,1)
# kernel /vmlinuz-version ro root=/dev/hda3
# initrd /initrd-version.img
#boot=/dev/hda2
default=0
timeout=10
splashimage=(hd0,1)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
title Red Hat Linux (2.4.7-10)
root (hd0,1)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.4.7-10 ro root=/dev/hda3 hdc=ide-scsi
initrd /initrd-2.4.7-10.img
title Windows 2000
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
You see the "title Windows 2000" and the "rootnoverify (hd0,0)"?
That (hd0,0) tells grub what partition to try to boot off of.
The hd0 tells it which harddrive to boot. And the ,0 tells it what partition to boot.
Grub's partition stuff is set up the same as a programmer counts. Computers start counting from zero.
0123456789 so on and so forth.
So the first harddrive would be hd0, the first partition will be 0. The second partition will be 1 and the third will be 2. Sort of confusing, I know. It screws me up a lot too.
So for example you have 3 harddrives and windows is on the second harddrive's first partition. Then you can go:
title Windows
rootnoverify (hd1,0)
chainloader +1
So change that, the changes you make to the configuration files are instantanious, grub reads that config each time it boots, so there is no extra step (like if your using lilo) to make the change go into effect.
If you are afraid of editing the file, just copy the original to your /root directory for backup. If you mess up you can always copy it back.
One of the nice features of grub is it's built-in command line interface. It's pretty primative, but you can use tab autocompletion to help you out. This way you can add commands manually if your config is goober'd or missing. But it's nice because you can use it to boot your system if your config is messed up...
It's been a while, but you can go when the boot menu comes up. (during a reboot)
hit ctrl-c to get to the command line. Or I think it's just you hit "c". If you want to edit a config, hit "e" on the entry you want to change.. but the changes won't be perminate.
So at the menu you'd go:
hit the c button
type in
rootnoverify (hd1,0) <enter>
chainloader +1 <enter>
boot <enter>
And that should be that. At any time you can hit the tab button to try to get the command to autocomplete, if you hit tab twice it will give you a partial list of possible entries... so you can go like this:
rootno<tab>
rootnoverify (hd<tab><tab>
possible entries:
hd0 hd1 hd2
rootnoverify (hd0,<tab><tab>
possible entries:
0 3
rootnoverify (hd0,0) <enter>
etc etc.
So that will help you figure out your config if you forget the numbering of all the partitions and such.
Hope all that makes sense. It's not to complex, but it is definately something new.
Linux is kinda like riding a bicycle, it definately takes some time to figure it out and acquire the skills to work it. But I think it's worth it.
