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I'm setting up a client's laptop (Acer Aspire E1-431-2867), and for some reason, the touch pad is disabled on start up.

  • Manually enabling it with the function key (fn+f7) works just fine.
  • The system dual boots between Ubuntu and Windows, and the problem only occurs in Ubuntu.
  • The problem is not due to anything I installed as it was happening with the Live USB as well.
  • I can't seem to find anything about this anywhere.

Is there a way to stop this from happening? NB: I would like to return the system to the owner in a couple days.

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  • Maybe the driver is blacklisted? less /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
    – kos
    Aug 12, 2015 at 2:17
  • @kos would this allow the touchpad to be enabled, though? I tested and this is not it.
    – RolandiXor
    Aug 12, 2015 at 2:28
  • Sorry, let me expand what I meant: I think the driver might be blacklisted; blacklisted drivers are listed in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf, so if the touchpad's driver is listed in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf it's not going to be loaded at startup (and, on the other hand, it would load by other means such as running insmod [driver] or such as using an fn+FX combo)
    – kos
    Aug 12, 2015 at 2:40
  • @kos the touchpad's driver wasn't on the list.
    – RolandiXor
    Aug 12, 2015 at 2:41
  • Then I have no idea about what's going on, but since you need to return the laptop to the client fast here's a workaround, if you don't find anything better: run acpi_listen an hit fn+F7; note the number in the third column (for example for an output such as hotkey ATKD 00000055 00000000 the number would be 55); run grep X /etc/acpi/events/*, where X is the number you noted, and see which file (script) is processing the ACPI event; then just run the script at a system runlevel high enough to have the ACPI services running already (not sure if /etc/rc.local would be enough).
    – kos
    Aug 12, 2015 at 3:07

1 Answer 1

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A simple workaround would be to execute the script which toggles the touchpad on / off at a system runlevel low enough before X is up and running, to make sure that the touchpad is working before a GUI is even started. So /etc/rc.local should be ok, but unfortunately I can't say a definitive word on this since I don't have my Ubuntu machine handy right now, and I can't actually test this. It should be fine tough.

  • Run acpi_listen and hit the fn+F7 keystroke; the output should be similiar to this one:
hotkey ATKD NNNNNNNN 00000000

Where NNNNNNNN is the fn+F7 keystroke's ACPI code;

  • Run grep NNNNNNNN /etc/acpi/events/*; the filename in the output should be the filename of the file in which the fn+F7 keystroke's ACPI code is handled;

  • Open the file with a text editor;

  • Look for a section like this one:

# ...
event=hotkey (ATKD|HOTK) NNNNNNNN
action=/etc/acpi/actions/action.sh
# ...

Where /etc/acpi/actions/action.sh is the script that is executed each time the fn+F7 keystroke is hit;

Now it's just a matter of executing the script in /etc/rc.local:

  • Open /etc/rc.local with a text editor;

  • Add this line to the end of the file before the exit 0 line:

# ...
/etc/acpi/actions/action.sh
# ...

That should be it. Reboot and see if the touchpad is enabled upon reboot;

In any case, if not needed, I'd suggest to remove the set -e command at the top of /etc/rc.local, or to modify the way the script is called calling e.g. a wrapper which calls the script itself and which always returns 0, to avoid the script breaking the execution of rc.local due to return values different from 0.

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  • @RolandiXor Try grep -r NNNNNNNN /etc/acpi/; in my ASUS notebook I remember the ACPI scripts to be located in a different location than the "default" one, so it might be the same for Acer notebooks
    – kos
    Aug 13, 2015 at 4:34
  • It's still not enabling the touchpad on boot. It seems to be the right thing, but for some reason it's not working.
    – RolandiXor
    Aug 13, 2015 at 5:40
  • Disabling acpi works, but also enables numlock on boot O_o
    – RolandiXor
    Aug 13, 2015 at 5:40
  • @RolandiXor Have you tried running the script manually from a shell? Does it toggle the touchpad on / off? if yes the problem is probably with /etc/rc.local
    – kos
    Aug 13, 2015 at 5:44
  • The script, it turns out, does not even exist!
    – RolandiXor
    Aug 13, 2015 at 5:52

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