Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

Timmi · 2017-12-18 21:44

I am new to this. I am running it live, because I need to copy some files to another partition before I can install.
And have identified some problems. What am I doing wrong?

1. In trying to move some files from my Windows10 data directory, to another partition, and am trying to highlight files. I select the first, then the last, while holding Shift, and it only highlights a section in the middle, like a couple of columns, not everything. And if I retry, it seems to highlight a different subset... it's sort of random. What's up with that?

2. I try to scroll in a browser (or any window), by dragging 2 fingers on the laptop's touchpad, and it does not scroll. I am forced to use the app's scrollbars. What am I doing wrong? Shoudn't q4 detect this and give you mouse gestures?

3. Mouse pointer is too slow. I found the control panel, where you adjust the mouse, and anything I change in there has no effect.
I tried changing mouse acceleration from the default 2x to 4x, then apply, and nothing, then to 10x, no change either.

Sorry for the silly questions - I've only ever used Mint and am accustomed to things working out of the box. (but I feel attracted by q4 because it seems to need less memory and be more efficient, and I would be able to use it on both my powerful main laptop and my daughter's netbook, by the looks of things)
My first impressions though, this OS may be only designed for old desktops, not laptops with touchpads. Is it ready for prime-time, or should I wait for a newer version to try again?

Thanks

Last edited by Timmi (2017-12-18 22:22)

tlmiller76 · 2017-12-18 23:36

1. What application are you trying to move them in (I assume Konqueror, but want to verify)
2. Are you on orion or scropion?I'm guessing scropion, but again, want to verify.
3. This is probably also related to #2, most likely libinput settings.

Last edited by tlmiller76 (2017-12-18 23:36)

Dai_trying · 2017-12-19 00:03

#1 This is a problem that has been highlighted before and apparently not yet fixed, you could try another file manager ( i just tested pcmanfm and it works ok here) but I usually have my konqueror set to detailed list view and can select files (using shift) sequentially without issue, but if you use another view (either icon view or multicolumn view) this problem will be there.

#2 I usually use a single swipe up and down at the right edge of my touch-pad for scrolling web pages, although this can be changed by editing a config file, but I can't say for sure exactly what to change is I understand Q4OS now uses libinput rather than synaptic for controlling the touch-pad but this could also be changed by installing xserver-xorg-input-synaptics and editing /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/50-synaptics.conf to your preference.

#3 If you go with synaptic as in #2 then there is also an option to set "AccelFactor" (default 0.075) which I think would speed up the cursor movement.

HTH

Timmi · 2017-12-19 02:50

tlmiller76 wrote:

1. What application are you trying to move them in (I assume Konqueror, but want to verify)
2. Are you on orion or scropion?I'm guessing scropion, but again, want to verify.
3. This is probably also related to #2, most likely libinput settings.

1 Yes, Konkeror. I tried to fing another file manager, but didn't see any.

2 No. Linux, Q4os. version 2.4 I believe. (that's what I have in my ISOs directory, but I don't know how to verify the one that's running).

Last edited by Timmi (2017-12-19 03:14)

Timmi · 2017-12-19 03:03

Dai_trying wrote:

#1 This is a problem that has been highlighted before and apparently not yet fixed, you could try another file manager ( i just tested pcmanfm and it works ok here) but I usually have my konqueror set to detailed list view and can select files (using shift) sequentially without issue, but if you use another view (either icon view or multicolumn view) this problem will be there.
#2 I usually use a single swipe up and down at the right edge of my touch-pad for scrolling web pages, although this can be changed by editing a config file, but I can't say for sure exactly what to change is I understand Q4OS now uses libinput rather than synaptic for controlling the touch-pad but this could also be changed by installing xserver-xorg-input-synaptics and editing /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/50-synaptics.conf to your preference.
#3 If you go with synaptic as in #2 then there is also an option to set "AccelFactor" (default 0.075) which I think would speed up the cursor movement.
HTH

1.Everything seems to be Konqueror-centric in this distro, such an important part of it's identity... but if it doesn't work and needs to be substituted, that's like de-constructing the desktop, and defeats it's intended purpose.

I aways use the large icon view. In fact, I am quite accustomed to seeing picture previews in these views... is there away for it to show previews as the icons?

2. thanks for that tip. that works. (I'd just become accustomed to the double-finger drag in windoze)

3. I've only ever used Synaptic Package Manager to download and install programs. Are we thinking about the same thing? I hadn't a clue there was a place in Synaptic to control the mouse. ???

Last edited by Timmi (2017-12-19 04:00)

tlmiller76 · 2017-12-19 03:45

No, there's synaptic package manager, and synaptics touchpad drivers.

And yes, being on q4os 2 (scorpion), you're machine is defaulting to libinput instead of synaptics.

To change, edit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/??-libinput.conf file (I don't know the number, but there's only 1 that says libinput) and change

Option "ScrollMethod" "edge"
to Option "ScrollMethod" "twofinger"

For movement speed, in the same file, look if you see a line with

Option "AccelSpeed" "x"

And raise the value of x if it does (max is 1), if it doesn't, try adding it to the file with a default value of 0.5, Option "AccelSpeed" "0.5"

Last edited by tlmiller76 (2017-12-19 03:51)

Timmi · 2017-12-19 04:09

tlmiller76 wrote:

No, there's synaptic package manager, and synaptics touchpad drivers.
And yes, being on q4os 2 (scorpion), you're machine is defaulting to libinput instead of synaptics.
To change, edit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/??-libinput.conf file (I don't know the number, but there's only 1 that says libinput) and change
Option "ScrollMethod" "edge"
to Option "ScrollMethod" "twofinger"
For movement speed, in the same file, look if you see a line with
Option "AccelSpeed" "x"
And raise the value of x if it does (max is 1), if it doesn't, try adding it to the file with a default value of 0.5, Option "AccelSpeed" "0.5"

So it is an "either/or" scenario, I can't have both, to choose whatever whichever is more useful.
Thank you for that tip. I will decide on which if I choose to definitively install.

For the speed, there was a place in the control panel to set it. Is there a reason why that has no effect?
I really do not see myself editing a file multitudes of times before I settle on a suitable speed.

tlmiller76 · 2017-12-19 04:35

Yes, the reason is because the control panel applet was originally desinged LONG before libinput existed, and is therefore not compatible with controlling libinput. This is the problem with almost all gui touchpad controls in linux. None of them were designed with libinput in mind, so only some even work partially, as they've added limited libinput support, but libinput is so drastically different than synaptics was previously, everything has to be completely re-engineered to work with it.

If you want to switch to synaptics instead (which does give you the ability to do edge scroll + 2-finger scroll both enabled), follow the instructions from Dai in post #3 to install the synaptics driver and prefer it to libinput. I've done this on a great many of my laptops, although I use libinput whenever I can, since synaptics driver has had all development ceased, and will get no further functionality patches, or features implemented as libinput will be the future. Sadly, yes, support for libinput using Xorg is garbage at the moment IMO. Luckily I do have some hardware that just basically works out of the box (my q4os laptop, my Fedora laptop, and my GalliumOS laptop) so that I'm able to use libinput on these. The rest of my devices I've had to install synaptics as I simply can't get acceptable performance from libinput.

q4osteam · 2017-12-19 14:34

@Timmi
The most easy way to select all files in a folder is to use 'ctrl+a' keys combination.

Timmi · 2017-12-20 23:00

q4osteam wrote:

@Timmi
The most easy way to select all files in a folder is to use 'ctrl+a' keys combination.

That is not a solution, because with that, you have to go back in and remove the ones you don't want holding Ctrl.

@all others, thank you guys for all your help.

Under Windows, I tried the Synaptics driver, but it won't work with my laptop; it requires the Elantech drivers. So I am not certain that switching to the Synaptics would solve my problem on my main laptop under Q4. It might work on the eeePC though. (sorry I didn't catch on sooner regarding "Synaptics" - in the Linux world, that had always been a package manager for me).

It is obvious that Q4os ist noch nicht fertig! Not quite ready for prime time just yet.

I had been desperately searching for a replacement to PepperMint, which ran fine (up to ver.5), on my daughter's laptop (an eeePC 1000he with N280 processor, 2GB RAM, 500GB hdd), until they came out with new versions, that just got slower and slower and slower. It's no longer that efficient sprightly OS for netbooks it thinks it is. Q4 just sounded so great, with it's small memory footprint, features, Trinity and all - it just sounded like good old German programming by the looks of it (my dad was a programmer in Deutschland and he could do miracles in 2K RAM back in the fifties). But if stuff isn't working, because you are mismatching the wrong consoles with the wrong code, there clearly is too much to be fixed, before it can be used as one's main OS, and I don't want to inflict that on my little girl.

I am glad that I came to ask the questions, rather than investing all that time for an install and trying to fix what is not fixable by myself.

Thank you everyone who came to answer. I really appreciate it.

Last edited by Timmi (2017-12-20 23:02)

crosscourt · 2017-12-20 23:34

We will help you with any problems you may have if youll give us a chance to do so. None of these problems are serious and you may still find you like Q4OS.

Q4OS is based on Debian Stretch 9.3. Mint is based on Ubuntu which is based on Debian so most distros have their roots in a few large well known Linux distributions.

If Mint worked well, you might look at using the XFCE version, which is far lighter than their KDE,Mate or Cinnamon versions.
If Q4OS really isnt your cup of tea, you might look at WattOS R9 LXDE or MXLinux 17 XFCE as alternatives.

Last edited by crosscourt (2017-12-21 02:01)

tlmiller76 · 2017-12-21 02:53

Timmi wrote:

q4osteam wrote:
@Timmi
The most easy way to select all files in a folder is to use 'ctrl+a' keys combination.
That is not a solution, because with that, you have to go back in and remove the ones you don't want holding Ctrl.
@all others, thank you guys for all your help.
Under Windows, I tried the Synaptics driver, but it won't work with my laptop; it requires the Elantech drivers. So I am not certain that switching to the Synaptics would solve my problem on my main laptop under Q4. It might work on the eeePC though. (sorry I didn't catch on sooner regarding "Synaptics" - in the Linux world, that had always been a package manager for me).
It is obvious that Q4os ist noch nicht fertig! Not quite ready for prime time just yet.
I had been desperately searching for a replacement to PepperMint, which ran fine (up to ver.5), on my daughter's laptop (an eeePC 1000he with N280 processor, 2GB RAM, 500GB hdd), until they came out with new versions, that just got slower and slower and slower. It's no longer that efficient sprightly OS for netbooks it thinks it is. Q4 just sounded so great, with it's small memory footprint, features, Trinity and all - it just sounded like good old German programming by the looks of it (my dad was a programmer in Deutschland and he could do miracles in 2K RAM back in the fifties). But if stuff isn't working, because you are mismatching the wrong consoles with the wrong code, there clearly is too much to be fixed, before it can be used as one's main OS, and I don't want to inflict that on my little girl.
I am glad that I came to ask the questions, rather than investing all that time for an install and trying to fix what is not fixable by myself.
Thank you everyone who came to answer. I really appreciate it.

Synaptics driver in linux is a catch-all. It works with most all touchpads, synaptics hardware, elantech, i2c, and various others. Not ALL, but many depending on the age of the machine (it doesn't work very well with the newest hardware due to the aforementioned no longer developed).

bin · 2017-12-21 08:07

Out of curiosity, have you tried using the previous version of Q4OS - Orion.

It is available at http://www.q4os.org/downloads3.html

As shown on that page it is still supported till May 2020 and as it may just help as it does not use libinput

crosscourt · 2017-12-21 23:13

He said Mint was working well which uses the 4.10-4.11 kernel by default depending on version vs Q4OS with the 4.9 so maybe there is a difference Im not aware of, curious.

If Mint works I doubt he needs to use Orion.

Q4OS Forum

#1 2017-12-18 21:44

Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#2 2017-12-18 23:36

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#3 2017-12-19 00:03

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#4 2017-12-19 02:50

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#5 2017-12-19 03:03

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#6 2017-12-19 03:45

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#7 2017-12-19 04:09

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#8 2017-12-19 04:35

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#9 2017-12-19 14:34

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#10 2017-12-20 23:00

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#11 2017-12-20 23:34

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#12 2017-12-21 02:53

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#13 2017-12-21 08:07

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

#14 2017-12-21 23:13

Re: Having little annoyances/issues with Q4 (running it live)

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