IMWheel

Version 0.9.6

In short, it's a program to use that good ole Microsoft Intellimouse Wheel under XFree on linux (others as well, including 4+ button mice!). So use this program and make Microsoft hardware useful for another OS! I hope this thought makes Billy Goats shiver ;)

Imwheel also supports stick type mouse with all directions of motion. GPM has been altered to support stick mice as well. Imwheel has been proven to work for many people and is the choice of a lazy generation (downloading and compiling/installing is excepted in this clause). I'm lazy too...so why the heck did I do all this code! Because I like too...and besides who can find X application resource settings to configure the wheel for everything?

IMWheel supports Linux and FreeBSD.
Linux users should get the regular archive.
FreeBSD users should get the nogpm archive.

Here's this version's clip from the CHANGES file:

Initial support & drivers (gpm & imwheel) for IBM ScrollPoint Mouse
  It is the mm+ps2 mouse type in gpm
  the IBM ScrollPoint PS/2 mouse uses the MouseManPlus Protocol in XFree86
  Support for up and down only for now...I must do a bit before other
    directions are considered! (for stick type mice thingers.)
  Pressing continuously will only result in one action.  Release and press
    again to scroll another notch.  (the regular scroll events come in too
    fast to be useful yet...)
  THANKS!!!!! TO Felix Klock for the ScrollPoint Mouse he MAILED ME!!!
  This driver is due to the initiative and sacrifice of a few bucks to get
    support for a mouse this guy loves...and from what I've read on newgroups
    many others also love!  Well you owe the possibility of this driver to
    Bryan for mailing me a mouse to be able to actually hack on the real
    thing.  Now continued support is guaranteed as well!
    mail your appreciation to Felix S Klock at pnkfelix@mit.edu
    He paid $23 or so for the mouse plus shipping to me (with normal 32cent
    stamps no less...due to the effects of the 1cent price increase in stamps
    I'm sure he was kinda glad to be rid of some of his 32cent stash to make
    room for the 33cent ones!)  Please consider sending him a dollar for his
    effort since you are reaping the rewards... (and hey send me a dollar! :)
Added mdump, a program to dump the mouse port, and anything else you want
  with a bitwise breakdown and a 3 byte per line dump.  Other interpretation
  is added for assumptions of what may be happening with mouse motions.
  I used this program to create the mm+ps2 driver for gpm.  It is not
  installed by 'make install' so copy it yourself if you're interested.
  the first arg on the command-line is taken to be the path of the mouse
  device, which defaults to /dev/mouse.  The second arg is how many bytes
  to dump per grab. This defaults to 3 but 4 is another common value to try.
  The third arg is not parsed but if present the first byte will be bit
  dumped like the rest of the bytes in a packet.
  You can also use this program to see the MHz speed for your mouse!
  e.g.:  mdump /dev/psaux 4 1   (for imps2 mouse device type)
         mdump /dev/psaux 3 1   (for ps2/mouseman+ mouse device types)
Added to mouse-mode setup programs for the intellimouse and mouseman plus.
  running these programs sends the right control codes to the mouse to
  activate the intellimouse or mouseman plus protocol.  The intellimouse and
  mouseman plus both default to ps2 mode.  the intellimouse and mouse man
  plus both support the imps2 protocol.  some mouse man plus type mice may
  not be intellimouse capable, but the IBM scrollpoint was capable of this
  mode, restricting it to up and down wheel emulation on it's stick.  To
  reset mouse run setps2.  setimps2 is for the intellimouse protocol.
  setmmplus is for the mouseman plus protocol.  us getmdt to see the mouse's
  reponse to the mouse device type probe.  The codes I've seen are as
  follows (<nn> is in hex format):
    <00>  mouseman plus (3 byte packets)
    <03>  intellimouse  (4 byte packets)
    <00>  plain ps2     (3 byte packets)
            when mouse is this, <AA> is received also after an <FA>
  Any <FA> type codes are ignored mouse responses, usually confirmation of
  the mouse receiving the controls the program sends it.
All these debugging  programs default to the /dev/mouse device node unless a
  path is passed in as the first argument.
None of the debugging programs have been tested with serial mice.
Fixed a missed regrab of the mouse after the configurator is closed.
Pid file is only used if user is using the /dev/gpmwheel FIFO. (Method #2)
Killing pids according to pidfile now checks to make sure the process is
  truely an imwheel process, and only kills it if it is an imwheel process.
  It also will only kill if using the /dev/gpmwheel FIFO.
Imwheel funtions correctly on multiple displays by using the -display
  option or setting the DISPLAY environment variable (use export/setenv!)
Thanks to Arnd Bergmann <arnd@uni.de> we now have gpm support for the
  Knopex Wineasy 4D mouse.  And due to his patches and them prompting me to
  update lotsa code we have support for intellimouse serial, as well as
  support for sideways actions.  This is only available through the FIFO.
  You must use Method#2 (a variant of which that is) that uses the wheel
  FIFO as set up by gpm.  XWindows cannot handle the 7 buttons correctly,
  it can only handle 5, which means only up and down will work with
  Method #1!
Added FreeBSD support, see the FREEBSD file for more.  It requires no
  changes to compile and install.
Added threshhold option for stick users of method #2 (it requires gpm)
  Use the -t or --threshhold option to set a threshhold from 0-7.
  The default is 2, it works well.
Added no-middle-button option (-n) to gpm.  Use this if you have trouble
  with unintentional middle button clicks while wheeling/sticking, and you
  would rather use Emulate3Buttons chording in X (XFree86 at least...)
Added conditional compile for gpm-imwheel directory.
Added a full manpage.

This is a gamma version, so report all bugs!

Your suggestions have been taken too heart and I added support for as much as suggested as possible. If you have another suggestion don't hesitate to email it to me.

Don't forget to merge the new imwheelrc with your own!!!

Current Archives

Full
  • imwheel-0.9.6.tar.gz 399KB

    Parts

  • imwheel-0.9.6.nogpm.tar.gz 66KB
  • gpm-1.16.0.imwheel.patch.gz 15KB

    Third Party Archives (Versions Unknown)

  • RPMS supplied by: Nick Koston

    Text Files

  • BUGS
  • CHANGES
  • README
  • imwheel manpage

    Old Archives

  • imwheel-0.9.5.tar.gz
  • imwheel-0.9.tar.gz


    Java Mouse Wheel issues

    Apparently NOT having wheel support now qualifies as a bug, or at least people are voting will decide on it's validity as a bug. If you want the wheel on you mouse to be supported by java then goto the following link and let your voice be heard. Unfortunately this is not a trivial problem for any OS to consider. I personally don't see it as a bug. As far as IMWheel and UNIX boxes are concerned I only need the scrollbars to be usable by PageUp and PageDown and/or cursor keys, actually any keyboard binding will do. And such a binding can be supported by programmers or by default in the AWT/Swing GUI classes. Thus this may be more of a java class issue than a Java issue for itself to handle through native routines, which in many cases is not possible due to the hardware device already being in use by drivers such as gpm and XWindows! But make your opinion known and vote for support in the fashion that makes the most compatible sense with UNIX and other OS's as well.

    You will have to become a registered developer to access this URL, but that's free.

    http://developer.java.sun.com/developer/bugParade/bugs/4202656.html


    Contact Me:
    Jonathan Atkins