[plug] Serial port problem with a mouse

[Len Bird]

Chris Griffin wrote:

> Could someone please shed some light on this one?
>
> I have an old 486 DX 100Mhz system I have been using for a Linux test bed.
> Trouble is the mouse, a MS ergo serial mouse, keeps "jumping". It is not
> the mouse as I have tried other mice with the same result. It is a bit of a
> pain when dragging an object an finding it just jumped halfway across the
> screen when you only wanted to go a cm or 2.
> I seem to remember such a problem somewhere in the deep dark past but
> cannot remember the details of how to fix it (must be getting older).
>
> Regards,
> Chris

I had a problem with my mouse whilst in Gnome/Netscape. The Netscape window
simply vanished when the mouse cursor went off the edge of the display. At
that time I had opted for 3-button emulation during Linux installation. Later
I reinstalled Linux WITHOUT the 3 button emulation and voila! the problem
disappeared. A further complication might have been the fact that the mouse is
an A-4 Tech wheel mouse, and Linux  installations do not really cater for all
variations in hardware, unless you can get a suitable driver. It is probably
worth your while to try disabling the 3-buttom emulation even although the
problem you describe is not identical with the one I had.

Regards,   Len Bird