On Tue, 24 May 2005, Chuck Hast wrote:
> Folks,
> I have a nephew out in Oklahoma who is really getting into Linux, both he
> and his wife. He asked me this question, and I have never used one of these
> things so not sure how to answer it, thought i would toss it out here to see
> what you all have to say
>
> > I've been half-heartedly looking at cordless keyboards and
> > tracballs. Most of them say they have drivers for M$ and Mac OS. I
> > haven't seen any that specifically say that they will work with any
> > Linux distro.
>
> There are some that have been on the market long enough that I assume
> that they have drivers for them under Linux, but can not say for sure since
> I have never tried to use one of these things.
>
> Any recommendations out there, are there some that work?
AFAIK the devices emulate standard (wired) peripherals, and the driver
enables special (nonvital) features, such as "press a button combo to
scroll" or "assign this button to this action in this program" on the
trackball, or extra keys on the keyboard.
There's usually an interval after the keyboard is in use, but before its
driver is installed. If it looks like a keyboard, it had better ACT like
one, or the manufacturer will have to deal with a mob with torches and
pitchforks. When in doubt, buy from a brick&mortar store with a generous
return policy.
Me, I would choose PS/2 over USB, for several reasons:
- I think there's no dedicated chip that controls USB, as there is for PS/2,
thus the CPU gets to do it (joy!).
- The dedicated PS/2 ports would be unoccupied if you chose a USB set.
- USB peripherals require that newer (hence less tested, hence possibly
buggier) drivers than do PS/2.
USB does have the advantage of hot-pluggability, but that's not a big deal
with keyboards and mice. Besides, the hardware may not mind the keyboard
going away in an X session, but the software probably will.
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