Re: How do I get GATEWAY2000 PS/2 mouse to work ?
> >From debian-user-request@lists.debian.org Tue Aug 13 16:44:48 1996
> Someone (sorry, lost name) wrote:
> > -- one never knows if/when PS/2 mouse is going to be available in a
> > downloaded kernel, whereas serial support is virtually always there.
>
> Todd Fries (todd@miango.com) responded:
> > Oh give me a break.
> Users shouldn't have to recompile their kernels to get their PS/2 mice to
> work.
Fine. Tell me your kernel version number and processor type and I'll have
ps/2 drivers targz'ed and uuencoded to you within a few hours.
> In my case, I used to select a module named psaux, and my PS/2 mouse
> worked fine. Recently I upgraded to Debian 1.1, circa July 1st. As far
> as I can tell, the psaux module is no longer an option.
Sounds like someone forgot something to me. I haven't started using Debian
yet; I am going to make a gradual migration as I like to do everything on
my system so I understand what is going on. Needless to say, I would never
trust a menu system to do things I should be doing myself anyway, but since
you seem to, you are considerably correct in saying that if a piece of code
is not in the kernel and it can be compiled as a module, I see no reason why
it cannot be optionally loaded and included with a distribution. But that is
my personal opinion and in no way represents Debian.
> Coincidentally, my mouse no longer works (when I "startx", the system says
> "Fatal server error: Cannot open mouse (No such device)").
Duh. No driver, no mouse support. See above for a quick return.
> My situation is caused by one or more of the following:
>
> 1. I am doing something wrong.
If the option is not there guess not.
> 2. There was a more serious problem with my OS upgrade.
Newer kernels replace older kernel modules. Therefore upgrading should have
gotten you everything you needed, instead of removing something you had.
> 3. Debian has a bug in its PS/2 mouse support.
I certainly can't determine this.
> 4. Default support for PS/2 mice was intentionally removed.
Hopefully not. My guess is an oversight/installation disk space concern. I
recall some of the module tar files were reportedly bad; perhaps the mouse
got left out? I am guessing here.
> Unfortunately, I haven't had time to look into this seriously so I'm
> still Debian-less.
Just because a system attempts to make things easier for you shouldn't mean
you ignore the details and rely on it exclusively without making any effort
at all to fix what is not working.
FYI, all you have to do is download the kernel source tree from one of many
kernel tree mirrors. Say, ftp://linux.ucs.indiana.edu/linux/kernel/v2.0 is
a favorite of mine. Grab linux-2.0.12.tar.gz. Type
tar xvzf linux-2.0.12.tar.gz
cd linux
make menuconfig
[ specify the processor type and make a module for non-serial mice and ps/2
]
make modules
(as root) make modules_install
(as root) depmod -a
(as root) modprobe psaux
Wow, you have ps2 mouse support. Now wasn't that difficult?
> But I'm suffering from a massive case of disbelief that this default
> capability would intentionally be removed.
Whether it is or is not intentionally missing is a side issue. You wish
to use your mouse. One thing I have found to be true in life is that if it
needs to be done, and nothing is being done, do it yourself. So if debian
isn't meeting your needs, in the several days you have been discussing this on
this list, you could have compiled your module several times over. Not that
that justifies Debian in not having ps/2 support for you, but you do what
has to be done to get done what you want to get done.
> Thanks for your support,
Hope I've come across as trying to help.
--
Todd Fries .. todd@miango.com
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