MOUSED(8)

NAME
moused - pass data from a serial mouse to the kernel

SYNOPSIS
moused [-DPRacdfs] [-I file] [-F rate] [-r resolution] [-S baudrate] [-W devicename] [-a X[,Y]] [-m N=M] [-w N] [-z target] [-t mousetype] [-3 [-E timeout]] -p port

moused [-Pd] -p port -i info

DESCRIPTION
moused and the console driver work together to support input from serial mice. They virtualize the mouse and provide user programs with mouse data in the standard format (see wsmouse(4)).

moused listens to the specified serial port for mouse data, interprets and then passes it via ioctls to the console driver. It reports translation movement, button press/release events and movement of the roller or the wheel if available. The roller/wheel movement is reported as “Z” axis movement.

If moused receives the signal SIGHUP, it will reopen the mouse port and reinitializes itself. Useful if the mouse is attached/detached while the system is suspended.

The following options are available:

-3  Emulate the third (middle) button for 2-button mice. It is emulated by pressing the left and right physical buttons simultaneously.

-D  Lower DTR on the serial port. This option is valid only if ‘mousesystems’ is selected as the protocol type. The DTR line may need to be dropped for a 3-button mouse to operate in the ‘mousesystems’ mode.

-E timeout
    When the third button emulation is enabled (see -3), moused waits at most timeout milliseconds before deciding whether two buttons are being pressed simultaneously. The default timeout is 100 milliseconds.

-F rate
    Set the report rate (reports per second) of the device, if supported.

-I file
    Write the process id of moused in the specified file. Without this option, the process id will be stored in /var/run/moused.pid.

-P  Do not start the Plug and Play COM device enumeration procedure when identifying the serial mouse. If this option is given together with the -i option, moused will not be able to print useful information for the serial mouse.

-R  Lower RTS on the serial port. This option is valid only if ‘mousesystems’ is selected as the protocol type by the -t option below. It is often used with the -D option above. Both RTS and DTR lines may need to be dropped for a 3-button mouse to operate in the ‘mousesystems’ mode.

-S baudrate
    Select the baud rate for the serial port (1200 to 9600, see also -s). Not all serial mice support this option.

-W devicename
    Select the wsmux(4) control device. The default is /dev/wsmuxctl0.

-a X[,Y]
    Accelerate or decelerate the mouse input. This is a linear acceleration only. Values less than 1.0 slow down movement, values greater than 1.0 speed it up. Specifying only one value sets the acceleration for both axes.

-c  Some mice report middle button down events as if the left and right buttons are being pressed. This option handles this.

-d  Enable debugging messages.

-f  Do not become a daemon and instead run as a foreground process. Useful for testing and debugging.

-i info
    Print specified information and quit. Available pieces of information are:

    port
        Device file name, e.g. /dev/tty00.

    if  Interface type: ‘serial’, ‘bus’, ‘inport’, ‘ps/2’, ‘sysmouse’, or ‘usb’.

    type
        Protocol type. One of the values listed under the -t option below.

    model
        Mouse model.

    all All of the above items. Print port, interface, type and model in this order in one line.

    If moused cannot determine the requested information, it prints ‘unknown’ or ‘generic’.

-m N=M
    Assign the physical button M to the logical button N. You may specify as many instances of this option as you like. More than one physical button may be assigned to a logical button at the same time. In this case the logical button will be down, if either of the assigned physical buttons is held down. Do not put spaces around ‘=’.

-p port
    Use port to communicate with the mouse.

-r resolution
    Set the resolution of the device; in Dots Per Inch, or ‘low’, ‘medium-low’, ‘medium-high’, or ‘high’. This option may not be supported by all devices.

-s  Select a baud rate of 9600 for the serial line (see also -S). Not all serial mice support this option.

-t type
    Specify the protocol type of the mouse attached to the port. You may explicitly specify a type listed below, or use ‘auto’ to let moused automatically select an appropriate protocol for the given mouse. If you entirely omit this option on the command line, ‘-t auto’ is assumed. Under normal circumstances, you need to use this option only if moused is not able to detect the protocol automatically.

    Note that if a protocol type is specified with this option, the -P option above is implied and Plug and Play COM device enumeration procedure will be disabled.

    Valid types for this option are listed below:

    microsoft
        Microsoft serial mouse protocol. Most 2-button serial mice use this protocol.

    intellimouse
        Microsoft IntelliMouse protocol. Genius NetMouse, ASCII Mie Mouse, Logitech MouseMan+ and FirstMouse+ use this protocol too. Other mice with a roller/wheel may be compatible with this protocol.

    mousesystems
        MouseSystems 5-byte protocol. 3-button mice may use this protocol.

    mmseries
        MM Series mouse protocol.

    logitech
        Logitech mouse protocol. Note that this is for old Logitech models. ‘mouseman’ or ‘intellimouse’ should be specified for newer models.

    mouseman
        Logitech MouseMan and TrackMan protocol. Some 3-button mice may be compatible with this protocol. Note that MouseMan+ and FirstMouse+ use ‘intellimouse’ protocol rather than this one.

    glidepoint
        ALPS GlidePoint protocol.

    thinkingmouse
        Kensington ThinkingMouse protocol.

    mmhitab
        Hitachi tablet protocol.

    x10mouseremote
        X10 MouseRemote.

    kidspad
        Genius Kidspad and Easypad protocol.

    versapad
        Interlink VersaPad protocol.

-w N
    Make the physical button N act as the wheel mode button. While this button is pressed, X and Y axis movement is reported to be zero and the Y axis movement is mapped to Z axis. You may further map the Z axis movement to virtual buttons by the -z option below.

-z target
    Map Z axis (roller/wheel) movement to another axis or to virtual buttons. The target virtual buttons need not exist as physical buttons. Note that mapping to logical buttons (with -m) is carried out after mapping from the Z axis movement to the virtual buttons is done. Valid target may be:

    x
    y   X or Y axis movement will be reported when the Z axis movement is detected.

    N   Report down events for the virtual buttons N and N+1 respectively when negative and positive Z axis movement is detected.

    N1 N2
        Report down events for the virtual buttons N1 and N2 respectively when negative and positive Z axis movement is detected.

    N1 N2 N3 N4
        This is useful for the mouse with two wheels of which the second wheel is used to generate horizontal scroll action, and for the mouse which has a knob or a stick which can detect the horizontal force applied by the user.

        The motion of the second wheel will be mapped to the buttons N3, for the negative direction, and N4, for the positive direction. If the buttons N3 and N4 actually exist in this mouse, their actions will not be detected.

        Note that horizontal movement or second roller/wheel movement may not always be detected, because there appears to be no accepted standard as to how it is encoded.

        Note also that some mice think left is the negative horizontal direction, others may think otherwise. Moreover, there are some mice whose two wheels are both mounted vertically, and the direction of the second vertical wheel does not match the first one's.

  Multiple Mice
As many instances of moused as the number of mice attached to the system may be run simultaneously; one instance for each serial mouse.

FILES
/dev/wsmuxctl0
    default wsmux(4) conrol device
/var/run/moused.pid
    default PID file

EXAMPLES
    moused -p /dev/tty00 -i type

Let moused determine the protocol type of the mouse at the serial port /dev/tty00. If successful, moused will print the type, otherwise it will say ``unknown''.

    moused -p /dev/tty00

If moused is able to identify the protocol type of the mouse at the specified port automatically, you can start the daemon without the -t option and enable the mouse pointer in the text console as above.

    moused -p /dev/tty01 -t microsoft

Start moused on the serial port /dev/tty01. The protocol type ‘microsoft’ is explicitly specified by the -t option.

    moused -p /dev/tty01 -m 1=3 -m 3=1

Assign the physical button 3 (right button) to the logical button 1 (logical left) and the physical button 1 (left) to the logical button 3 (logical right). This will effectively swap the left and right buttons.

    moused -p /dev/tty01 -t intellimouse -z 4

Report negative Z axis (roller) movement as the button 4 pressed and positive Z axis movement as the button 5 pressed.

The mouse daemon is normally enabled by setting ‘moused=YES’ in /etc/rc.conf.

SEE ALSO
wsmouse(4), wsmux(4), rc.conf(5), wsmoused(8)

STANDARDS
In order to support PnP serial mice moused partially supports Plug and Play External COM Device Specification. However, due to various degrees of conformance to the specification by existing serial mice, it does not strictly follow version 1.0 of the standard. Even with this less strict approach, it may not always determine an appropriate protocol type for the given serial mouse.

HISTORY
The moused mouse daemon first appeared in FreeBSD 2.2 and NetBSD 1.6.

AUTHORS
moused was written by -nosplit Michael Smith <msmith@FreeBSD.org>. This manual page was written by Mike Pritchard <mpp@FreeBSD.org>. The daemon and manual page have since been updated by Kazutaka Yokota <yokota@FreeBSD.org>. The NetBSD port was done by Lennart Augustsson <augustss@NetBSD.org>.

BUGS
Many pad devices behave as if the first (left) button were pressed if the user “taps” the surface of the pad. In contrast, some ALPS GlidePoint and Interlink VersaPad models treat the tapping action as fourth button events. Use the option ‘-m 1=4’ for these models to obtain the same effect as the other pad devices.