Mouse only emulation?

[jancheta]

Hello, I was wondering if it was possible to make the tinypilot only forward mouse and look like a mouse device instead of keyboard/mouse combo?

[mtlynch]

It's not possible natively, but you could rewrite your /opt/tinypilot-privileged/init-usb-gadget file to make it act like a pure mouse rather than its current behavior (USB hub with mouse + keyboard inserted).

See this commit for an example of how I changed it to a keyboard-only device:

tiny-pilot/ansible-role-tinypilot@dca65cf

You'd have to take out the keyboard parts as opposed to the mouse parts.

You might also have to find a different value for idProduct because 0xa4ac might be specifically for keyboard, but it's possible that it's for keyboard or mouse.

[croadfeldt]

This could be automated fairly easily, as well as adding in the mass storage item I just opened another discussion on. If there's desire, I could write up the automation for it while I am adding the mass storage item. Perhaps a select for enable / disable each component, along with the ability to upload / select disk images to mount? Would want some help with the UI portion, but I can do the rest.

[mtlynch]

Thanks!

The UI part is really what's challenging though. The user can achieve this today if they open up their init-usb-gadget file.

I'd want to hear more about the scenario that requires this before we start modifying the UI to support it.

[jancheta]

Im an embedded software engineer and been WFH bc covid...The product I am developing on now does not have X11 so I cannot use VNC as I have before. Thought this would be a slick way to get mouse input (paired with a webcam to see the integrated display) and control it while I am working from home. For some reason it seems like the presence of a keyboard messes with the mouse being picked up as well. I havent had much time to figure out exactly where the root issue is nor have I had the time to try your suggestions yet but I do plan to try them when I can squeeze it in.