Introduction
Having recently purchased a Logitech trackball in order (hopefully) to reduce repetitive strain injury, I wanted to recover the ability to scroll, as well as using the trackball for its primary purpose. Here's how it's done; with all due acknowledgement to the Ubuntu forums for much of the information.
Important note.
Try as I may, this method does not work in Debian Squeeze. Apart from anything else, there is no native xorg.conf file to edit and even if you produce one, it still fails to produce the desired results. So please don't waste your time following this article. If I find a reliable method, rest assured, I'll write it here for all to see.
The Method
You need to make adjustments in two places: to your xorg.conf file and to your Iceweasel browser. I'll deal with the xorg.conf file first.
Open up a terminal and navigate to /etc/X11 and select the command ls (list) like so:
This will show your current directories and files, and you should see within, the file, xorg.conf
Now copy your xorg.conf file to make a backup. When making changes to configuration files, this (in my view) is an essential step, so if something is miss-typed or whatever, you can always recover to a known good file. My preference is to use the date of backup, but choose whatever you wish. However, for the purposes of example, my command may look something like this:
Next, use your favourite text editor to open up xorg.conf. I used vim but you may choose something different.
This is what my file looked like before the changes were made, the relevant section being; Section "Input Device" Identifier "Configured Mouse"
The first part you need to change, is the line marked
Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2"
This line becomes:
Option "Protocol" "ExplorerPS/2"
Now, after
Option "EmulateThreeButtons" "true"
add the following lines:
Option "Buttons" "9"
Option "EmulateWheel" "1"
Option "EmulateWheelButton" "8" # for right handed people
Option "YAxisMapping" "4 5"
Option "XAxisMapping" "6 7"
This section of your xorg.conf file should now look similar to this:
''Note:'' ''the'' ''# for right handed people'' ''is simply a note for information and does not form part of the command sequence. It can be omitted if you wish.''
Now save the file and exit.
The second part involves editing two lines in your Iceweasel (or Firefox) browser.
Open up the browser and in the address bar type:
about:config
now in the Filter bar, type;
scroll
Locate the line:
mousewheel.horizscroll.withnokey.action
and change from the default value of 2 by highlighting the line and right clicking. Select Modify from the drop down box and give it a value of 0 (zero).
The next (and final) adjustment to be made, is to locate the line:
mousewheel.horizscroll.withnokey.sysnumlines
and in the same manner, change its value to true.
This is what you can expect to see:
Note: ''ignore'' ''general.smooth.Scroll.'' ''This is something I set for unrelated reasons and does'' ''not'' ''form part of this procedure.''
Finally, close down your browser and reboot your Xserver by hitting Ctrl+Alt+Backspace.
You should now be able to use the '''small left hand button + the trackball''' to scroll through pages.
