Touch Screen Calibration Tool

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 00:50

Greetings,

I really love this Linux distribution and think it is very well made. I have been using it for several months now and intend to continue using it for as long as I can. I have it installed on my 2007 Panasonic Toughbook CF-30 mk.3 (which I am using to make this post). It runs the 32-bit trinity version very well and almost feels like a new computer (even though it is 18 years old as of the time of this post). I have the same version installed on another computer that is slightly less old and it runs on it just as well as it does on my Toughbook. Learning how to use linux has taken some getting used to but I have managed to "konquer " every obstacle I've encountered except for one. This single issue has had to do with the touchscreen. I have asked for help before and help was recieved (many thanks to hchiper for helping me) but unfortunately I still haven't figured out how to get it to work right. I went digging and found some things about touchpad calibration matricies and such and have been expiramenting with it trying to figure it out but haven't yet. Any help with it would be appreciated. For the future, I think it would save at least a few people from having this same issue if there were some sort of touch screen calibration tool that worked similarly to how you set your screen size for certain things like various videogames where it has the frame that you drag out to the size you need.

With Much Appreciation,
OldTechLover

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 03:11

You can install xinput-calibrator by searching in Synaptic and install it. It will help you calibrate your touchscreen. I hacve never used it so cant attest to its ease of use but I have seen others use it with success.

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 03:22

I believe that is what hchiper had told me to do a while back and I was unable to get it to work. Something weird with my computer wouldn't let it access stuff. Haven't figured out what the issue is yet.

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 03:26

Youre running older hardware so theres no telling how successful you will be with various apps. Maybe doing an extensive search online about your hardware and seeing if anyone else has had any success with a particular app.

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 03:29

that's a good idea. I've done lots of research but havent looked into anything about the specific hardware

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 03:35

Ill post back if I spot anything as Im a technogeezer and have done most of my pc tech work in older hardware.

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 03:40

Im surprised you had issues with xinput-calibrator as its an older program that should be compatible. I remember it being used by many back in the 2000s.

Last edited by crosscourt (2025-02-21 04:17)

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 03:49

Did some research and it appears many have the same problem as you do with this laptop. No real fixes have shown up so far and again, sometimes it can be a hardware issue that isnt supported properly by drivers, thus calibration tools simply dont work.

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 04:49

I decided to try to install the x11 touchscreen calibrator again because I couldn't remember what exactly had stoped me last time and found that when I put (apt-get install x11-touchscreen-calibrator) into the terminal it omes back with "E: Could not open lock file /var/lib/dpkg/lock-frontent - open (13: Permission denied)" and "E: Unable to acquire the dpkg frontend lock (/var/lib/dpkg/lock-frontend), are you root?". I recognize the lib from looking at the libinput stuff that is built into the OS and has something to do with touchpad, touchscreen, and tablet screen calibration but at some point I stoped looking at it and forgot how I got where I was. I might try to find my way back there and look into it if I can't find a way to make the x11 touchscreen calibrator work.

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 04:54

I figured it out. I had to use the terminal in superuser mode.

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 04:57

Youve gotta be root for it to work.

Last edited by crosscourt (2025-02-21 05:00)

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 05:00

I see you figured it out,

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 05:21

I think there is more to it than just installing it but everything in the github page is like a foreign language to me. I know it has something to do with a matrix but all I know about matricies is what I learned about in my high school algebra 2 class last year and I don't remember much of it.

crosscourt · 2025-02-21 05:27

LOL!! I remember very little of those days. There may be a how to for the app online. Maybe try the Debian wiki, https://wiki.debian.org

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 05:41

I looked and can't find anything but I'm also not very savvy with the Debian wiki so I could be searching wrong. From what I can tell from the x11-touchscreen-calibrator github, it seems that it is supposed to just be a background system that works on its own. I might try changing my screen resolution and then changing it back to see if it does anything because I saw something about that in the github.

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 05:49

Messing with the resolution didn't change anything. I'm not sure what to do from here.

OldTechLover · 2025-02-21 05:57

I'm going to go ahead and call it a night, I'm still in school so I'll just have to pick this up again sometime later. Tomorrow afternoon/evening maybe.

Oconcal · 2025-06-10 03:10

Most of these older touchscreens required utouch

 sudo apt install utouch

Then install and run the following like other touchscreens:

 sudo apt install xinput-calibrator

then list your devices to get the ID

xinput list

then use that id number instead of <ID> below

xinput_calibrator --dev <ID>

then follow the instructions on the screen, pushing the squares, etc. one you are done with that, display the matrix calibration with:

xinput_calibrator

then take the output of that, create and put it:

/usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/99-calibration.conf

with the fallowing code

Section "InputClass"
   Identifier "calibration"
   MatchProduct "Your Touchscreen Device Name"  # Replace with the device name
   Option "MinX" "your_min_x"
   Option "MaxX" "your_max_x"
   Option "MinY" "your_min_y"
   Option "MaxY" "your_max_y"
EndSection

If that doesn't try

 xinput_calibrator -v

and post the error or if the device doesn't show up to program.

Last edited by Oconcal (2025-06-10 04:09)

crosscourt · 2025-06-10 03:42

In fact, the 2007 Panasonic Toughbook CF-30 Mk3 didnt work with xinput-calibrator and there arent many alternatives. He certainly can follow your directions and see what happens, but my research showed many have not had any success with it. This laptop was originally designed for Windows and for some reason it doesnt cooperate much with Linux. The early touchscreens were a mixed bag.

Heres some instructions from the Debian wiki,

https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/xi … .1.en.html

Last edited by crosscourt (2025-06-10 03:52)

Oconcal · 2025-06-10 04:12

crosscourt wrote:

In fact, the 2007 Panasonic Toughbook CF-30 Mk3 didnt work with xinput-calibrator and there arent many alternatives. He certainly can follow your directions and see what happens, but my research showed many have not had any success with it. This laptop was originally designed for Windows and for some reason it doesnt cooperate much with Linux. The early touchscreens were a mixed bag.
Heres some instructions from the Debian wiki,
https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/xi … .1.en.html

I edited my post, because I forgot the older ones needed utouch and its probably why some hit or miss since some distros used to load this in by default.

Last edited by Oconcal (2025-06-10 04:18)

crosscourt · 2025-06-10 16:37

Even utouch is an issue with this laptop according to reports. Utouch doesnt work with all hardware.

Last edited by crosscourt (2025-06-10 17:37)

Oconcal · 2025-06-10 20:11

crosscourt wrote:

Even utouch is an issue with this laptop according to reports. Utouch doesnt work with all hardware.

Why would it stop working after 13 years? I used to have one of these laptops and ran ubuntu on it.

crosscourt · 2025-06-10 20:14

I used to do tech work with these laptops and we had regular issues with them. Utouch isnt the issue the Panasonic Toughbook is but yes, Utouch doesnt work with all hardware. I can remember back in 2013 when Ubuntu was having issues with Utouch and drivers continued to be an issue with some hardware not being recognized.
The early models from 2007 ran well with Windows but had many issues with Linux(doesnt mean it wont work, just iffy). Police forces, construction managers and others loved these laptops.

Last edited by crosscourt (2025-06-10 20:29)

crosscourt · 2025-06-10 20:45

Canonical first created Utouch in 2010 and it was released with Ubuntu 10.10, so it didnt even exist back when the 2007 Panasonic Toughbook was launched.
Certainly older hardware many times does really well with newer kernels/drivers/apps but its no guarantee all aspects of older laptops will work with modern Linux.

Oconcal · 2025-06-13 00:29

crosscourt wrote:

Canonical first created Utouch in 2010 and it was released with Ubuntu 10.10, so it didnt even exist back when the 2007 Panasonic Toughbook was launched.
Certainly older hardware many times does really well with newer kernels/drivers/apps but its no guarantee all aspects of older laptops will work with modern Linux.

Well when I switched it I installed 11.04 on mine. But they should have it listed what you have to do now in their compatible laptop database if it did change. Sme of them they stopped supporting after 18.04.

Now my 90s IBM touchscreen, I have to fix and compile a driver written for Suse.

Last edited by Oconcal (2025-06-13 00:30)

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#1 2025-02-21 00:50

Touch Screen Calibration Tool

#2 2025-02-21 03:11

Re: Touch Screen Calibration Tool

#3 2025-02-21 03:22

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#4 2025-02-21 03:26

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