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Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

williambharding.com

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Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#161

Post by jpetso »

MrLeftHand wrote: post #131
chupasaurus wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are more than 2 desktop environments for Linux you've tried if my guess is right (since you've tried Ubuntu). Imo KDE is light years ahead than Windows but requires to set it up for your taste.

Can KDE do something about touchpad support whist the underlying X and kernel support for the hardware is absolute rubbish? It was a while ago I used KDE, but from what I can remember there was no option to fine tune touchpad behaviour. I like that under Linux you have a freedom of choice when it comes to window managers. KDE, Gnome2-3, XFCE, Cinnamon, you name it. It's awesome to have so many tools for one problem.…

KDE does have to configuration in its system settings, but it obviously only relies on the standard X/kernel drivers and is only a convenience GUI for setting these options.

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#163

Post by pmontra »

dilap wrote: post #157
HeadsUpHigh wrote: post #153

Absolutely no. I never liked the macbook touchpad. I tried using it a couple times. It really felt like they had to shoehorn every action into a gesture to the point where a lot of them felt extremely cumbersome. For example it took me a few tries until I managed to tile windows. I'm using a regular non-luxury laptop. I'm mostly using it with a mouse because the trackpad goes off every now and then( it's a hardware i…

I think you're definitely a special case. For me the MacBook touchpad is my favorite input method, better than even a mouse -- because it's very precise, and the gestures are very handy! Generally, most people are very fond of mac touchpads. So, I'd say from a linux strategic perspective, or the perspectie of the greater good, the answer is yes!

I'm another special case. The only good thing of the mac touchpad is pinch to zoom integrated into many applications. I really don't want gestures. Scrolling and moving the pointer on my HP laptops always worked really well. Maybe it's a HP thing. However I remeber that the same touchpad worked much better with Ubuntu 8.04 than with Windows XP. Two finger scrolling instead of scrolling along the edge, among the other things.

I disable clicking on the touchpad and I use the 3 hardware buttons because they're much better at being buttons and how would I middle click and paste with a touchpad? Plus maybe the cursor nudge from the article. No, the touchpad won't sell me a Mac.

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#164

Post by vinay427 »

acchow wrote: post #23
isostatic wrote: post #3

Am I the only one who prefers the nipples on thinkpads?

I used thinkpad nipples for 5+ years. Macbook took a couple months of adjustment. But there is almost no use of muscle whatsoever when moving the mouse on a macbook. Thinkpads feel incredibly straining in comparison now. And scrolling on a macbook...completely effortless. There is nothing like it.

TrackPoint scrolling feels far more effortless to me. No need to move your fingers back and forth repeatedly to keep swiping.

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#165

Post by Simon_says »

101km wrote: post #11

I have been using 12" MacBooks since they came out because I live out of a backpack and travel a lot. I cannot find anything comparable in terms of size/weight/battery and build quality. Especially the trackpad, nothing is remotely close. Otherwise I'd get that and put Arch on it. People complain Apple is expensive, not so sure. The TCO may actually be less because of the high resale value. It is also more convenient…

> More than once when faced with crossing an annoying border (TSA, sigh) I'd sell the Macbook at my origin and simply pickup a new one at the destination.

Wow! I've heard of this as a practice reserved for the ultra-paranoid, but never actually seen somebody who does it. What's your threat model? Do you have some reason to believe that the US three-letter-agencies might target you in particular? Are you famous in security circles?

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#166

Post by m-app »

mikemcquaid wrote: post #118
beaconstudios wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they mean the classic install process of "curl -s | bash", used to download and then execute a bash script. The real question in my opinion is what kind of tools can fully set up an entire environment, including sessions, from a bash script? Homebrew only gets you so far.

Apologies for the self-plug but this is what I built for GitHub to do exactly this: https://github.com/MikeMcQuaid/strap . Add Homebrew Bundle and a Dotfiles repo into the mix and you get what was described. This is obviously pretty Homebrew and GitHub centric because I work on both.

Just want to thank you for `strap` and your `dotfiles` repo's, Mike! They've been terrifically helpful in setting up my Mac environment.

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#167

Post by rayiner »

jcelerier wrote: post #145
OJFord wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tried for a while, and running it natively really hammered the battery, got nowhere close to the same uptime as when running macOS. Running it in a VM was OK on battery, but of course there's CPU/RAM overhead, and the trackpad _feels_ nice, but it still doesn't quite move in the right way.

when using powertop on my MBP 2014 I can get 7-8 hours of battery.

What’s the catch? If powertop is so good why isnt’t it built into distros?

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#168

Post by ubermonkey »

ramijames wrote: post #86
101km wrote: post #11

I have been using 12" MacBooks since they came out because I live out of a backpack and travel a lot. I cannot find anything comparable in terms of size/weight/battery and build quality. Especially the trackpad, nothing is remotely close. Otherwise I'd get that and put Arch on it. People complain Apple is expensive, not so sure. The TCO may actually be less because of the high resale value. It is also more convenient…

Can you tell me more about "curl-to-bash"? Setting up my mac can be a matter of days and I hate it.

Whoa, why? Or, more specifically, why are you not using migration from a prior Mac or from a Time Machine backup? The ease with which a Mac user can be up and running on new hardware is, to me, one of the larger advantages of the platform. I know, this being HN, that you likely have a number of FOSS tools installed; are they somehow not getting picked up properly by migration & backup?

True story: we were robbed in 2012, in a quickie smash-and-grab through a rear patio (glass) door. They were in and out in maybe 1 minute, and took only what they could see from the yard -- which included my Macbook Pro.

We're well insured, so I went and got a new one the next day, plugged it into my Time Machine drive, and went and had lunch. When I came back, my new machine was ready to go -- all my apps, all my data, and even all my app windows were restored.

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#169

Post by nerdponx »

101km wrote: post #11

I have been using 12" MacBooks since they came out because I live out of a backpack and travel a lot. I cannot find anything comparable in terms of size/weight/battery and build quality. Especially the trackpad, nothing is remotely close. Otherwise I'd get that and put Arch on it. People complain Apple is expensive, not so sure. The TCO may actually be less because of the high resale value. It is also more convenient…

Agreed. Apple makes the best consumer mobile computer hardware by far, repairability issues aside. The touchpad is originally what sold me on my first MacBook (2013 13" Retina) and it is still the feature I miss the most on other laptops.

Re: Linux touchpad like a Macbook: goal worth pursuing?

#170

Post by ubermonkey »

maggit wrote: post #48

Yes, please do! I've spent some time researching this as well, and to me it seems like the author has missed one thing; the Mac touchpad hardware is so much better than other touchpad hardware. (As I understand it, the competition is barred from making similar touchpads due to patents) I have been running Linux on MacBook Pros for many years, and the touchpad is a constant source of disappointment. For the effort to…

I'm not sure it's IP that's kept Wintel makers from doing decent trackpads. I think they just didn't care until recently.

I have both a 2015 13" rMBP and a 2018 Dell XPS15 on my desk. The Dell's hardware is really fantastic. Overall, it's not QUITE the equal of Cupertino, but it's easily the best Windows hardware I've seen since the glory days of the ThinkPad. The trackpad in particular, though, is just as good as the Apple one, I think. First time I've seen a Windows trackpad that was worth a damn, so I was SHOCKED.

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