touchpad buttons sometimes stop working for several seconds

[Vincent Lefevre]

Hi,

I have a new laptop. An issue I have is that the touchpad buttons
often stop working for several seconds (under X11).

This is visible even with evtest: when I click on any of the soft
buttons, I normally get an event like

Event: time 1698773368.142943, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 272 (BTN_LEFT), value 0

But when the problem occurs, I do not get such an event.

Any idea to fix this?

The device is: VEN_04F3:00 04F3:311C

$ xinput list-props 13
Device 'VEN_04F3:00 04F3:311C Touchpad':
Device Enabled (190): 1
Coordinate Transformation Matrix (192): 1.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000
libinput Tapping Enabled (353): 0
libinput Tapping Enabled Default (354): 0
libinput Tapping Drag Enabled (355): 1
libinput Tapping Drag Enabled Default (356): 1
libinput Tapping Drag Lock Enabled (357): 0
libinput Tapping Drag Lock Enabled Default (358): 0
libinput Tapping Button Mapping Enabled (359): 1, 0
libinput Tapping Button Mapping Default (360): 1, 0
libinput Natural Scrolling Enabled (332): 0
libinput Natural Scrolling Enabled Default (333): 0
libinput Disable While Typing Enabled (361): 1
libinput Disable While Typing Enabled Default (362): 1
libinput Scroll Methods Available (334): 1, 1, 0
libinput Scroll Method Enabled (335): 1, 0, 0
libinput Scroll Method Enabled Default (336): 1, 0, 0
libinput Click Methods Available (363): 1, 1
libinput Click Method Enabled (364): 1, 0
libinput Click Method Enabled Default (365): 1, 0
libinput Middle Emulation Enabled (366): 0
libinput Middle Emulation Enabled Default (367): 0
libinput Accel Speed (341): 0.000000
libinput Accel Speed Default (342): 0.000000
libinput Accel Profiles Available (343): 1, 1
libinput Accel Profile Enabled (344): 1, 0
libinput Accel Profile Enabled Default (345): 1, 0
libinput Left Handed Enabled (346): 0
libinput Left Handed Enabled Default (347): 0
libinput Send Events Modes Available (313): 1, 1
libinput Send Events Mode Enabled (314): 0, 0
libinput Send Events Mode Enabled Default (315): 0, 0
Device Node (316): "/dev/input/event14"
Device Product ID (317): 1267, 12572
libinput Drag Lock Buttons (348): <no items>
libinput Horizontal Scroll Enabled (349): 1
libinput Scrolling Pixel Distance (350): 15
libinput Scrolling Pixel Distance Default (351): 15
libinput High Resolution Wheel Scroll Enabled (352): 1

The X input drivers:

$ dpkg -l | grep xserver-xorg-input
ii xserver-xorg-input-all 1:7.7+23 amd64 X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
ii xserver-xorg-input-libinput 1.2.1-1+b1 amd64 X.Org X server -- libinput input driver
ii xserver-xorg-input-wacom 1.1.0-1 amd64 X.Org X server -- Wacom input driver

--
Vincent Lefèvre <vin...@vinc17.net> - Web: <https://www.vinc17.net/>
100% accessible validated (X)HTML - Blog: <https://www.vinc17.net/blog/>
Work: CR INRIA - computer arithmetic / AriC project (LIP, ENS-Lyon)

[Max Nikulin]

On 01/11/2023 00:53, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> I have a new laptop. An issue I have is that the touchpad buttons often
> stop working for several seconds (under X11).

Can you move cursor during these periods?

KDE has the "disable touchpad when typing" feature (likely a kded5
plugin exposed as D-Bus /modules/kded_touchpad object). In your case

> libinput Disable While Typing Enabled (361): 1

I have heard about palm detection, but I am unsure if it is implemented
in firmware or in some user space daemons.

Are there any suspicious log entries in "journalctl --user" and
"journalctl --system" output?

[Vincent Lefevre]

On 2023-11-01 09:09:45 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
> On 01/11/2023 00:53, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> > I have a new laptop. An issue I have is that the touchpad buttons often
> > stop working for several seconds (under X11).
>
> Can you move cursor during these periods?

Yes, no issues with the cursor (mouse pointer).

> KDE has the "disable touchpad when typing" feature (likely a kded5 plugin
> exposed as D-Bus /modules/kded_touchpad object). In your case
>
> > libinput Disable While Typing Enabled (361): 1

But since I can still move the mouse pointer, the touchpad isn't
disabled. (And I am not typing.)

> I have heard about palm detection, but I am unsure if it is implemented in
> firmware or in some user space daemons.
>
> Are there any suspicious log entries in "journalctl --user" and "journalctl
> --system" output?

Nothing suspicious. Nothing in /var/log/Xorg.0.log either.

[Vincent Lefevre]

On 2023-11-01 20:15:49 +0100, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> On 2023-11-01 09:09:45 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
> > On 01/11/2023 00:53, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> > > I have a new laptop. An issue I have is that the touchpad buttons often
> > > stop working for several seconds (under X11).
> >
> > Can you move cursor during these periods?
>
> Yes, no issues with the cursor (mouse pointer).
>

> > I have heard about palm detection, but I am unsure if it is implemented in
> > firmware or in some user space daemons.
> >
> > Are there any suspicious log entries in "journalctl --user" and "journalctl
> > --system" output?
>
> Nothing suspicious. Nothing in /var/log/Xorg.0.log either.

But this is something in /var/log/lightdm/x-0.log:

(EE) event14 - VEN_04F3:00 04F3:311C Touchpad: kernel bug: Touch jump detected and discarded.
See https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.22.1/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html for details

several times (the issue also occurs in lightdm).

I don't know whether this is related, though. And the page no longer
exists.

[Max Nikulin]

On 02/11/2023 04:51, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> On 2023-11-01 20:15:49 +0100, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
>> On 2023-11-01 09:09:45 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
>>> Can you move cursor during these periods?
>>
>> Yes, no issues with the cursor (mouse pointer).

I would still try to disable typing detection to test if it affects
behavior of buttons.

> But this is something in /var/log/lightdm/x-0.log:
>
> (EE) event14 - VEN_04F3:00 04F3:311C Touchpad: kernel bug: Touch jump detected and discarded.
> See https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.22.1/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html for details

Do these entries correlate with issues with buttons?

After reading of the linked page I suspect that the touchpad may
misinterpret button clicks as cursor jumps.

[Vincent Lefevre]

On 2023-11-02 22:46:13 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
> On 02/11/2023 04:51, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> > On 2023-11-01 20:15:49 +0100, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> > > On 2023-11-01 09:09:45 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
> > > > Can you move cursor during these periods?
> > >
> > > Yes, no issues with the cursor (mouse pointer).
>
> I would still try to disable typing detection to test if it affects
> behavior of buttons.

I can see now what it does: when I'm typing, the mouse pointer
movements are disabled (but clicking is still enabled). However,
the mouse pointer events are still reported by evtest. So this
setting is unrelated to my issue, where the click events are not
reported by evtest, i.e. my issue occurs at a lower level than
libinput: the kernel driver?

> > But this is something in /var/log/lightdm/x-0.log:
> >
> > (EE) event14 - VEN_04F3:00 04F3:311C Touchpad: kernel bug: Touch jump detected and discarded.
> > See https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.22.1/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html for details
>
> Do these entries correlate with issues with buttons?

I can actually see 6 messages like that in /var/log/Xorg.0.log,
while my issue occurs much more often. So I think that this is
unrelated.

[Vincent Lefevre]

Some additional details: the time during which the issue occurs
varies very much: from 25" to 6'20".

The time between two consecutive issues also varies and can be
very short, such as 30".

[Max Nikulin]

On 03/11/2023 01:55, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
>>> (EE) event14 - VEN_04F3:00 04F3:311C Touchpad: kernel bug: Touch jump detected and discarded.
>>> See https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.22.1/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html for details
>

> I can actually see 6 messages like that in /var/log/Xorg.0.log,
> while my issue occurs much more often. So I think that this is
> unrelated.

From the "See ... for details" page

> Note
>
> This warning is ratelimited and will stop appearing after a few times, even if the touchpad jumps continue.

[Vincent Lefevre]

Thanks. The above URL is incorrect (I reported a bug about it).
A correct URL is

https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.22.0/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html

Unfortunately, this doesn't allow me to see whether this could be

[Max Nikulin]

On 04/11/2023 15:59, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> On 2023-11-03 09:48:16 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
>> From the "See ... for details" page
>>
>>> Note
>>>
>>> This warning is ratelimited and will stop appearing after a few times, even if the touchpad jumps continue.

[...]
> https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.22.0/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html

I think
<https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html>
has a bit less chance to became outdated.

> Unfortunately, this doesn't allow me to see whether this could be
> related.

My point is that events detected as jumps may suppress software buttons.
Since not all such events are logged, it may be not so easy to find
correlation. Perhaps there are debugging options to enable logging of
all jumps.

Debugging an issue (that perhaps is unrelated to input devices) I have
realized that there is an older driver xserver-xorg-input-synaptics that
you might try instead of libinput. Several years ago I installed this
package to make tap to click working, but likely it is not necessary any
more in my case. I have to "upload" an update to my memory that current
default driver for touchpad is xserver-xorg-input-libinput.

P.S. I have found libinput docs are informative and well written
- <https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/faqs.html>
FAQ
-
<https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/tapping.html#constraints-while-tapping>
Tap-to-click behaviour :: Constraints while tapping
-
<https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/clickpad-softbuttons.html>
Clickpad software button behavior

[Vincent Lefevre]

On 2023-11-08 12:06:10 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
> On 04/11/2023 15:59, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> > On 2023-11-03 09:48:16 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
> > > From the "See ... for details" page
> > >
> > > > Note
> > > >
> > > > This warning is ratelimited and will stop appearing after a few times, even if the touchpad jumps continue.
> [...]
> > https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/1.22.0/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html
>
> I think <https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/touchpad-jumping-cursors.html>
> has a bit less chance to became outdated.
>
> > Unfortunately, this doesn't allow me to see whether this could be
> > related.
>
> My point is that events detected as jumps may suppress software buttons.
> Since not all such events are logged, it may be not so easy to find
> correlation. Perhaps there are debugging options to enable logging of all
> jumps.

The question is what suppresses software buttons. If this is libinput
that suppresses them (just like it suppressed pointer moves when
typing, while pointer moves are still reported by the kernel), then
this is unrelated to my issue.

> Debugging an issue (that perhaps is unrelated to input devices) I have
> realized that there is an older driver xserver-xorg-input-synaptics that you
> might try instead of libinput. Several years ago I installed this package to
> make tap to click working, but likely it is not necessary any more in my
> case. I have to "upload" an update to my memory that current default driver
> for touchpad is xserver-xorg-input-libinput.

I could try, but I fear that this will not change anything as this
is the kernel that doesn't report the clicks.

BTW, I often accidentally touch the bottom of the touchpad with the
palm of my hand (this may be because the touchpad is very large),
yielding multitouch (rather annoying). It might be what causes the
issue under particular circumstances. I'm wondering whether something
can be done about that (note: if I put something thick over it, this
disables the accidental touches, but this prevents the buttons from
working, as a consequence).

[Max Nikulin]

On 16/11/2023 20:59, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
>
> The question is what suppresses software buttons. If this is libinput
> that suppresses them (just like it suppressed pointer moves when
> typing, while pointer moves are still reported by the kernel), then
> this is unrelated to my issue.

I am unsure if kernel is involved at all. It may be device firmware
(have you checked for firmware updates?), it may be libinput as the
device driver. Perhaps libinput may send some commands to touchpad to
suppress generation of events for some interval of time.

Hypotheses:
- Issues are inherent to this model, so Windows users should suffer as well,
- Hardware issues with particular device.

If a dedicated discussion group exists then participants may be more
experienced in debugging.

You posted output of xinput and mentioned evtest. I have never used
"libinput debug-events", however I would try if this tool may provide
more details.

> BTW, I often accidentally touch the bottom of the touchpad with the
> palm of my hand

I am unsure if you have read relevant parts of libinput docs
https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/palm-detection.html

I hope I solved my variant of "buttons does not work for some period of
time" by dropping a snippet into xorg.conf.d that enables tap-to-click.
For me it is more convenient than clicks in the bottom area. My
observation is that hardware click works more reliable if I raise the
finger for a moment after moving cursor. However in my case period of
clickbuttons inactivity is usually just a few seconds (unless prolonged
by repeating clicks). Sometimes clicks are ignored when a finger is at
the bottom touchpad edge.

[Jeffrey Walton]

I believe there's a libinput-record that you can use to record events.
Later you can inspect the events and play them back. Also see
<https://manpages.debian.org/testing/libinput-tools/libinput-record.1.en.html>.

Jeff

[Vincent Lefevre]

On 2023-11-16 23:53:51 +0700, Max Nikulin wrote:
> On 16/11/2023 20:59, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> > The question is what suppresses software buttons. If this is libinput
> > that suppresses them (just like it suppressed pointer moves when
> > typing, while pointer moves are still reported by the kernel), then
> > this is unrelated to my issue.
>
> I am unsure if kernel is involved at all. It may be device firmware (have
> you checked for firmware updates?),

Yes, firmware is up-to-date (/etc/update-motd.d/85-fwupd signals
when new versions are available).

> it may be libinput as the device driver. Perhaps libinput may send
> some commands to touchpad to suppress generation of events for some
> interval of time.

I would have expected something in the log in such a case.

In the next few days, I'll try to look at issues more closely with
tools from libinput-tools.

> > BTW, I often accidentally touch the bottom of the touchpad with the
> > palm of my hand
>
> I am unsure if you have read relevant parts of libinput docs
> https://wayland.freedesktop.org/libinput/doc/latest/palm-detection.html

Just a note to say that palm detection is either disabled or it does
not work (I'll try to see whether MT_TOOL_PALM can be generated).

> I hope I solved my variant of "buttons does not work for some period of
> time" by dropping a snippet into xorg.conf.d that enables tap-to-click.

I don't like tap-to-click (I don't want accidental clicks).

> For me it is more convenient than clicks in the bottom area. My
> observation is that hardware click works more reliable if I raise
> the finger for a moment after moving cursor. However in my case
> period of clickbuttons inactivity is usually just a few seconds
> (unless prolonged by repeating clicks). Sometimes clicks are ignored
> when a finger is at the bottom touchpad edge.

When I tried, I tested clicks on various parts of the touchpad.
But I would say that even if clicks are to be ignored, an event
is normally generated by the kernel. I could see that the kernel
generates a BTN_LEFT event even when it doesn't know where the
click has been done; in such a case, I get no clicks at the X11
level (obviously).

BTW, what model of touchpad do you have?

[Max Nikulin]

On 17/11/2023 19:54, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> BTW, what model of touchpad do you have?

Device: SYNA30AC:00 06CB:CDEB Touchpad
Kernel: /dev/input/event11
Group: 9
Seat: seat0, default
Size: 106x61mm
Capabilities: pointer gesture
Tap-to-click: disabled
Tap-and-drag: enabled
Tap drag lock: disabled
Left-handed: disabled
Nat.scrolling: disabled
Middle emulation: disabled
Calibration: n/a
Scroll methods: *two-finger edge
Click methods: *button-areas clickfinger
Disable-w-typing: enabled
Disable-w-trackpointing: enabled
Accel profiles: flat *adaptive
Rotation: n/a