How to get side buttons working on mouse in Linux running in VMware player

Question

I have the Razer Deathadder mouse (left handed edition) and some of the buttons don't work on Linux. For example the back and forwards buttons on the side, pressed by the thumb don't work and pressing down on the scroll wheel doesn't do anything. As far as I can tell Razer hasn't come out with software for Linux.

Update: as per Journeyman Geek's recommendation I'm trying to install a third party configuration tool but I'm stuck at the install part

Update 2: as per Dennis' comment I have installed the configuration utility and have copied razer.conf to /etc/razer.conf what is the next step?

I'm using the latest version of Mint Linux. What must I do to get this functionality?

I found a file that gives me a window that looks like it's for setting configuration but none of the options have anything in the list when I click on them

Output of ps ax | grep razer

 1935 ?        S      0:00 /usr/local/sbin/razerd -f -B -P /run/razerd/razerd.pid
 4210 pts/0    S+     0:00 grep --colour=auto razer

I forgot to mention that Linux is running in VMware Player. Here is the output of xinput

Solution

In many cases, razer hardware dosen't really do things in a standard way, or needs a little prodding for things to work right. I've not gotten a chance to test it out myself, but there's a FOSS, unofficial driver/configuration tool for razer mice, and regular deathadders seem supported. I suspect the left handed version should work.

If this dosen't work, you can check if these keys actually do something with evtest, then map them with an appropriate tool - It may not be trivial it may need the mouse to get a specific message from the system, as with their keyboards, and this may need some hacking around.

That said, all this is meant for physical systems. You might be able to configure a keyboard shortcut in windows then bind that to something on linux or to passthrough the mouse to the vm, possibly. I tried the former and it worked. The latter resulted in a frozen, unusable mouse. Quite frankly, the question as originally written was entirely plausible. The current scenario, post edit is just not something thats worth the effort.

Comments

[Lawrence]

You will need to map the buttons to make them do something. What distro are you running ?

[Celeritas]

@Lawrence well go on. Saying map the buttons certainly isn't enough but it may be a good start. I'm using Mint.

[Lawrence]

Well I need to know where to start to go on lol. Have you had a look at this link ? - help.ubuntu.com/community/ManyButtonsMouseHowto

[Dennis]

1. Executing sudo -i changes to root's home directory. Just execute sudo make install instead of sudo -i followed by make install. 2. Do the mouse buttons get recognized at least? Execute xev from a terminal, your cursor over the window that opens up and, while maintaining the cursor perfectly still, press the scroll wheel and the thumb buttons. If they do get recognized, you should see Button press and Button release events.

[Celeritas]

1) worked 2) the left button, right button, scroll wheel, clicking the scroll wheel are detected. The two side buttons where the thumb show no change.

[Celeritas]

@Dennis since the side buttons aren't even detected in xev does this mean there's no hope?

[Dennis]

If they had been detected, there would have been a rather easy solution (i.e., remapping them). It might still be, although it's unlikely at this point. Execute xinput and then xinput get-button-map <ID>, where <ID> is the ID of your mouse, taken from the first command. Even if the buttons aren't detected at all, it is still "just" a driver issue.

[Celeritas]

@Dennis I updated question with info. I'm running Linux as a VM so it had two devices listed as mice.

[Celeritas]

Thanks, I'm brand new at Linux so I need some help. I'm following the instructions in the readme file but there is no make file so I'm stuck. e.g. under the heading "installing" why does it say to make install?

[Thalys]

cmake . is supposed to make the makefiles for you- you did install the deps, then run that before make install right? I don't have a mint system, but the commands given do make sense if I were compiling this for ubuntu.

[Celeritas]

I installed the dependencies and ran cmake . and make but when I got to the part where I run sudo -I and make install it didn't work and said "make: *** No rule to make target install'. Stop.". I ran pwd` and it said /root and wouldn't let me cd to the directory where I had the files from razercfg. What should I do?

[Thalys]

you don't need to run make after cmake. cmake does what make does... being at root is kind of odd though. I'll see if I can get a VM up to try the compilation part of it and see what's happening.

[Celeritas]

I've got it installed but I'm not sure how to edit the razer.conf file

[Thalys]

You probably should try the graphical settings tools instead

[Celeritas]

How do I run the graphical settings tool?

[Thalys]

sudo razerd ; grazercfg I'd guess. The former starts the razer daemon if it wasn't already. The latter starts grazerd. This is under 'using the tools' in the readme

[Celeritas]

I tried and got Razer device service daemon Failed to bind socket to /var/run/razerd/socket: Address already in use grazercfg: command not found

[Thalys]

the razer daemon is already running - thats a good thing. I apparently misread the instructions - try qrazerd

[Celeritas]

Command not found, I can't see a file named qrazerd anywhere. However I found a file that when I ran it, it looked like the qui configuration we're looking for but all of the options were missing (see edit)

[Braiam]

@Celeritas How about the output of ps ax | grep razer?

[Celeritas]

@Braiam see edit to question

[Dennis]

According to the site you linked to, the graphical device configuration tool is called qrazercfg, not grazercfg. (CC @Celeritas)

[Thalys]

Yup, I mentioned it a later on. I quite literally had a dyslexic moment. And apparently another. All this is in the readme so, I guess I should have just copy-pasted ;p

[Celeritas]

I can't get grazercfq to work. The window opens and it's responsive but whenever I click an option nothing happens.

[Thalys]

You didn't mention this - I do believe vmware emulates its own mouse device and as such, your linux system is not seeing your razer mouse because as far as its concerned it isn't there- it sees the vmware emulated mouse. Its simply how it works, and you just wasted your time.

[Thalys]

This will work though, and probably will help the next guy who needs to work this out - just not in this specific configuration. I do believe some vm software might let you passthrough a specific device, but I have no clue if that includes mice and keyboards, or if it works on vmware player.

[Celeritas]

superuser.com/questions/35830/…

[Celeritas]

How come the buttons work automatically with Windows 7 in VMware workstation but not Linux? I guess that's just a feature of the OS...