xinput_calibrator(1)

💖 xinput_calibrator(1) — the manual page, but make it cute 💖

okay bestie, welcome to the xinput_calibrator(1) glow-up ✨ this is the manual page for a tiny program that fixes your touchscreen when your taps are landing in the wrong place. it's giving "your finger says here, your cursor says over there" energy, and we're gonna fix it together 🫶

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🌸 NAME 🌸

xinput_calibrator — a generic touchscreen calibration program for X.Org. yes, generic. it works with everybody. it's an ally 💅

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

xinput_calibrator [OPTIONS]

that's it. that's the whole vibe. one command, some optional flags, and a dream 🌈

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🎀 DESCRIPTION 🎀

so, xinput_calibrator is a program for calibrating your touchscreen, when you're using the X Window System. like, it teaches your screen where your finger actually is. iconic behaviour, honestly 👑

right now it features:

• works for any standard Xorg touchscreen driver (uses XInput protocol)
• mis-click detection (prevents bogus calibration)
• dynamically recalibrates the evdev driver
• outputs the calibration as xorg.conf.d snippet file
• and more

see http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/xinput_calibrator for the whole lore iykyk

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💅 OPTIONS 💅

• -h, --help — prints a help message, and it lists the version and the available options. the classic "what do you even do" flag 🥰
• -v, --verbose — prints debug messages while the whole thing is happening. turn this on when you're confused, which, no judgement, happens to all of us 💀
• --list — lists the calibratable input devices. like a little guest list for the calibration party 🎉
• --device device_name_or_id — picks one specific device to calibrate. use --list to see the calibratable input devices first, bestie, don't just guess 🫶
• --precalib min_x max_x min_y max_y — manually hands over the current calibration setting. this is the move when your calibration values are stored in your xorg.conf, but the driver does not export them through XInput (eg. the calibrator can not know these values). so you just... tell it. main character energy ✨
• --misclick nr_of_pixels — sets the misclick threshold (0=off, default: 15 pixels). four numbers, huge consequences 🔥
• --no-timeout — turns off the timeout. no rush, we have time 🧘
• --output-type auto|xorg.conf.d|xinput — the type of config to output (auto=automatically detect, default: auto). pick your fighter 💖
• --output-filename filename — the filename to write calibration data to. name it something cute 🌸
• --fake — emulates a fake driver (for testing purposes). useful to test the calibrator without applying the values, and possibly even without having a touchscreen. fake it till you make it fr fr 🙈
• --geometry widthxheight — manually provides the geometry (width and height) for the calibration window. you set the stage, queen 👑

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🦋 USAGE 🦋

run xinput_calibrator in a terminal, because it prints out the calibration values and instructions on standard output. it talks to you. it's chatty. respect it 💬

after clicking the 4 calibration points, xinput_calibrator will calculate the new calibration values. then, depending on the Xorg touchscreen driver you use, the new values can be made permanent in different ways:

Evdev: automatically recalibrates the driver for this session. supports following --output-types: auto, xorg.conf.d, xinput

Usbtouchscreen: automatically recalibrates the kernel module, saved in /etc/modprobe.conf.local supports following --output-types: auto

Other Xorg touchscreen drivers: no automatic calibration possible. supports following --output-types: auto, xorg.conf.d

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🌟 EXAMPLES 🌟

to run the calibrator, type this in your terminal:

xinput_calibrator

if something goes wrong, or not as expected, turn on verbose messages:

xinput_calibrator -v

if you have to manually provide the current calibration values (when using EVDEV, you can use this to reset the calibration first):

xinput_calibrator --precalib 0 1000 0 1000

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💜 TROUBLESHOOTING 💜

in general, run the calibrator with the -v option — it will tell you what happens and what goes wrong. it's basically a little therapist that explains itself 😭

Mis-click detection: the calibrator can automatically detect clicks with unreasonable values. this prevents you from ending up with a bogus calibration. thank you for your service 🫡

if you keep getting the message 'Mis-click detected, restarting...', one of the following is happening:

1. you are bad at clicking on crosses, use a stylus or increase the --misclick threshold
2. your device is not properly supported by the kernel, it interprets the clicks wrong
3. your screen has a non-linear deformation, 4-point calibration can not help you

number 3 is the "sorry bestie, this one's beyond me" of calibration 💀

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🌈 XWAYLAND 🌈

Xwayland is an X server that uses a Wayland Compositor as backend. Xwayland acts as translation layer between the X protocol and the Wayland protocol but does not have direct access to the hardware. the X Input Extension devices created by Xwayland ("xwayland-pointer", "xwayland-keyboard", etc.) map to the Wayland protocol devices, not to physical devices.

there are no input drivers involved in handling Xwayland devices and the configuration files provided by the calibrator are never read.

so yeah, under Xwayland the calibrator's config files are just sitting there unread. tragic. unbothered. untouched 🥲

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👑 SEE ALSO 👑

• xinput(1)

go read that one too, we stan cross-referencing 💖

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🍓 AUTHORS 🍓

Tias Guns <tias@ulyssis.org>

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and that's the page, bestie!! 🎀 this was xinput_calibrator(1), brought to you by the one and only Tias Guns, and this manual page itself is dated with all the timeless energy of a classic — calibrate responsibly, click your crosses accurately, and remember: mis-click detection is not a personal attack, it's a boundary 💅✨💖