DevTerm Day One: suggestions

DevTerm
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I just got my DevTerm, and as soon as I turned it on I started thinking of detailed tweaks to make it more comfortable.

I thought it might be a good idea to share some of those here, and hopefully hear other people’s tips and suggestions too!

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Emulating a scroll wheel

I created a file named /etc/X11/Xsession.d/98custom-devterm, containing the following line:

xinput --set-prop 9 'libinput Scroll Method Enabled' 0 0 1

So now, when I hold down the middle mouse button the trackball acts as a scroll wheel. This means I can’t use the middle mouse button of course, but I don’t think I will need it, and having a scroll wheel is a lot more useful.

ETA: yes, this does work for both horizontal and vertical scrolling (I just checked). Of course, with the DevTerm’s aspect ratio you wlll be doing a lot more vertical scrolling…

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Change default font size for text-mode console

If you change your DevTerm to start up in text mode (which I did), the default font is pretty small, and even if you have good eyesight, the wide screen means that lines of text in man pages etc. are very long. I edited /etc/default/console-setup and changed these lines:

FONTFACE=Terminus
FONTSIZE=12x24

There are other size options of course – see man console-setup for details

I think there may be a more modern way to do this, but it seems to work…

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Heya @bobtato ! These are some great thoughts!

I tried out the “emulating a scroll wheel” one on my new DevTerm, and I had to do a couple of extra steps:

  • install xinput (apt install xinput worked just fine)
  • the correct device index on mine was 8, rather than 9 (for ClockworkPI DevTerm Mouse - 9 was axp20x-pek, a part of the keyboard entities)

These might be differences between the RPi CM3 and A06 Linux distributions? (I’m assuming based on you posting this in early September that you might be using a CM3). At any rate, in case anyone else is trying out bobtato’s excellent tips and having trouble, hopefully this will be helpful

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I don’t know if it counts a detailed tweak, but I disabled autologin by commenting out everything in /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d/12-autologin.conf. The default user and pass in the A06 distributions are both cpi and it’s probably smart to change that too.

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Those are both good points!

I think I probably did have to install xinput first, and you’re right, it is better not to rely on the numeric id. Xinput actually lets you use a device name (as shown by xinput --list), so the line above should be:

xinput --set-prop 'ClockworkPI Devterm Mouse' 'libinput Scroll Method Enabled' 0 0 1

(The device name on my CM3 DevTerm is the same as on your A06, which makes sense).

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As an alternative to middle click scrolling, here’s an AntimicroX (apt install antimicro) mapping that lets you scroll with the D-Pad.

dpad-scroll.joystick.amgp.xml 
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<joystick configversion="19" appversion="3.1.4">
    <!--The SDL name for a joystick is included for informational purposes only.-->
    <sdlname>ClockworkPI DevTerm</sdlname>
    <!--The Unique ID for a joystick is included for informational purposes only.-->
    <uniqueID>03000000af1e00002400000010010000</uniqueID>
    <sets>
        <set index="1">
            <axis index="5">
                <center_value>0</center_value>
                <min_value>-32767</min_value>
                <max_value>32767</max_value>
                <throttle>normal</throttle>
            </axis>
            <axis index="3">
                <center_value>0</center_value>
                <min_value>-32767</min_value>
                <max_value>32767</max_value>
                <throttle>normal</throttle>
            </axis>
            <axis index="4">
                <center_value>0</center_value>
                <min_value>-32767</min_value>
                <max_value>32767</max_value>
                <throttle>normal</throttle>
            </axis>
            <axis index="1">
                <center_value>0</center_value>
                <min_value>-32767</min_value>
                <max_value>32767</max_value>
                <throttle>normal</throttle>
                <axisbutton index="1">
                    <slots>
                        <slot>
                            <code>6</code>
                            <mode>mousebutton</mode>
                        </slot>
                    </slots>
                </axisbutton>
                <axisbutton index="2">
                    <slots>
                        <slot>
                            <code>7</code>
                            <mode>mousebutton</mode>
                        </slot>
                    </slots>
                </axisbutton>
            </axis>
            <axis index="2">
                <center_value>0</center_value>
                <min_value>-32767</min_value>
                <max_value>32767</max_value>
                <throttle>normal</throttle>
                <axisbutton index="1">
                    <wheelspeedx>10</wheelspeedx>
                    <wheelspeedy>10</wheelspeedy>
                    <slots>
                        <slot>
                            <code>4</code>
                            <mode>mousebutton</mode>
                        </slot>
                    </slots>
                </axisbutton>
                <axisbutton index="2">
                    <wheelspeedx>10</wheelspeedx>
                    <wheelspeedy>10</wheelspeedy>
                    <slots>
                        <slot>
                            <code>5</code>
                            <mode>mousebutton</mode>
                        </slot>
                    </slots>
                </axisbutton>
            </axis>
        </set>
    </sets>
</joystick>
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Okay a couple more security fixes: the default password for root is also cpi, which the SSH warning on first boot doesn’t mention, so change that.

And the private key for the clockworkpi package repo was erroneously uploaded to github so to remove the public key until it’s replaced, run sudo apt-key del 478B1249 (you can double check that’s the right ID from the end of the fingerprint shown by apt-key list)

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yo, thank you so much! lots of people will be able to make heavy use of this.