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Linux Mint is a free Linux-based operating system designed for use on desktop and laptop computers.

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How do I make Mint more touchscreen friendly? (reddthat.com)

submitted 4 days ago by ordnance_qf_17_pounder@reddthat.com to c/linuxmint@lemmy.ml

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I recently got a Thinkpad Yoga, put Mint on it, all good. I love it. Only issue is, sometimes I like to fold the laptop and use it like a tablet when I'm not going to be doing much typing. But the touchscreen is hit or miss.

I've managed to get it working perfectly in Firefox where it behaves exactly like an Android tablet or iPad with swipes, taps, and long presses. But when I try it outside of Firefox, the behaviour is different. For example, a swipe acts like a click and drag with a mouse, rather than scrolling, which is the behaviour I want.

I'm a Linux noob, so pls don't be too harsh. Is there any universal way to make the touchscreen act like a tablet?

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[–] humanamerican@lemmy.zip 6 points 4 days ago (2 children)

I don't think Cinnamon (the Mint desktop environment) has a lot of touchscreen support. You might want to consider switching to KDE or Gnome, which might be easier if you picked a different distro, such as Fedora or Ubuntu.

Might even be the perfect excuse for you to try a Universal Blue distro, such as Bluefin or Aurora. They are based on Fedora but distributed as immutable container images, meaning its really hard to bork your system. Perfect for a beginner who wants to experiment without fear of rendering their computer unusable.

[–] rimu@piefed.social 2 points 4 days ago (2 children)

I've got a Thinkpad Yoga and the touch situation with KDE 5 is unusably bad. Maybe v6 improved on it but it seems like Gnome has a big lead in this area.

[–] user224@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

If you used X11, yeah, that just emulates a mouse pointer making the experience horrible. I use KDE, works perfectly fine with Wayland, X11 barely.

[–] rimu@piefed.social 1 points 4 days ago

Yes I use X11... That'll be the problem.

[–] humanamerican@lemmy.zip 2 points 4 days ago

Yes, 6 is better on the touchscreen. In fact, its better on every front. I never used Plasma before 6 and now I can't shut up about how great it is.

[–] ordnance_qf_17_pounder@reddthat.com 1 points 4 days ago

I've actually tried Gnome and while the layout is much more touchscreen friendly, it gave me a bunch of weird issues in other areas.

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll have a look!

[–] sic_semper_tyrannis 2 points 4 days ago

I daily Mint but don't have the experience you want.

I have however used Kinoite on a 2-in-1 laptop and it worked flawlessly. When the laptop was folded it auto disabled the physical keyboard.

[–] user224@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 4 days ago (2 children)

One thing I haven't seen mentioned, does Mint still use X11? I use Arch with KDE Plasma, also on a yoga, and it's just as unusable with X11 as you say. It just emulates a mouse pointer. Wayland has proper touchscreen support which just works.

[–] ordnance_qf_17_pounder@reddthat.com 1 points 4 days ago

I've tried Wayland on Mint, and it had a major bug where the panel just didn't work at all. Tapping and even clicking with the actual trackpad did nothing.

[–] swab148@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 4 days ago

Yeah, Cinnamon has Wayland experimentally, but still uses X11 by default.