Mouse for the PinePhone?

[Peter Gamma]

To this date, I could not a better mouse, than the Elecom Cap Clip. There are new Elecom Bluetooth mouse models available on ebay:

https://www.ebay.ch/sch/sis.html?_nkw=EL...1985639305

are these especially designed for small Japanese hands? I used my Elecom Cap Clip together with this Bluetooth keyboard with trackpad:

https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=13835

Still waiting for my PinePhone from Ricardo Switzerland. I was at the post office today, but It wasn t there yet. But the PinePhone is also available on ebay now from a seller. They have it on stock, although it is sold out in the Pine64 store. I can buy it also there, and it should be in Switzerland in a week or so.

I used the Elecom Cap Clip together with the Bluetooth keyboard with trackpad both paired over Bluetooth with Android phones. This combination always worked fine, I never had any problems with this setup. The touchpad of the keyboard works, but it is not as accurate as the Elecom mouse. The Elecom mouse really feels like a real desktop mouse. If you got used to it, you can use it instead of this. And the Elecom is the smallest mouse I could find. It is great to wear it in your pocket. You can stick it at the side of a phonebag with the included plastic holder, and it is not too bulky .

[Peter Gamma]

I use this mouse since several years:

https://www.ebay.ch/itm/ELECOM-wireless-...449c99591c

I never had any issues with it and was always happy with it.

[Peter Gamma]

I use this mouse since several years:

https://www.ebay.ch/itm/ELECOM-wireless-...449c99591c

I never had any issues with it and was always happy with it.

I never had issues with this mouse, but on the PinPhone. On PostmarketOS, the connection is not stable. Martijn Braam never showed a mouse in his videos, except for the trackpad on his usb-c setup. Follow and trust verified examples of mouse and keyboards. This is an advice from someone who suffered.

[Peter Gamma]

Today I bought a "Logitech M557 Bluetooth Wireless Mouse".  On sale for $19.99 otherwise $24.99.  Works fine.
I also have an old Motorola BT mouse (nothing special) which works just as well.

I'd venture to say the "Logitech Pebble 350 Bluetooth Mouse" or "Logitech Bluetooth Pebble Mouse M350" (both $24.99) would work.
If you're anywhere you can find these models give them a try. 

As a side note, remember you can have only one connected at a time, unlike with the wired/dongle/receiver mice.

Thanks for sharing your experience. I cannot recommend the Elecom cap clip mouse for the PinePhone PMOS: It disconnects repeatetely. I could also not find any Linux drivers on the Elecom web site.

The Logitec mouse is interesting. It might be also helpful to look at some thirt party Logitec GITHUB projects:

https://github.com/PixlOne/logiops

https://github.com/libratbag/piper/

The more that can be done with a mouse, the more interesting it becomes.

[robthebold]

I've got a Microsoft Bluetooth mouse that's called "Microsoft Bluetooth Mouse". It pretty much works with everything. Got the first one so my wife's med student could use the EMR software from her Microsoft tablet. But it also works with Macs. iDevices, all the pinephone distros I've tried. My Sony Sailfish phone. Linux desktops*, of course. It's not fancy, but is available in multiple colors. But I don't have a "rose gold" phone, so mine is black. It's a little more compact than an "ergonomic" mouse from MS or Logitech, etc. Reasonable price at 20 USD.

I was totally surprised that an MS product was the most cost-effective and simplest to deploy option that I could lay my hands on in 15 minutes, but there we are.

*I've got an ancient Samsung x86 tablet that doesn't support Bluetooth 4 that the mouse won't work with. So there's the counterpoint.

[Peter Gamma]

PhD candidate Matthew Higgins tested Fedora Desktop Apps on the Pinephone:

https://youtu.be/D2ZyZo1r5KY

Among these was LibreOffice. He showed that it is not possible in LibreOffice to get a context menu by touching the touch screen. Some apps offer this option on Android.

The Logitech M557 Bluetooth Wireless Mouse was confirmed to work with the PinePhone here in this thread. In Switzerland, this model is only available in one store which sells ink carrages for 80 USD. But I suppose the chance is there that newer models M558 and M560 also work with the PinePhone. They can be found for 30 – 40 USD, and they have as far as I know no bulky AAA battery in the case, which the M557 has.

I suppose both should work also with thirt party Logitec GITHUB projects:

https://github.com/PixlOne/logiops

https://github.com/libratbag/piper/

When using a mouse with a phone with a small screen, an option to right click which offers a menu would be very helpful. Eventually such an option could be implemented with these GITHUB projects? For Microsoft mice, I could not find GITHUB projects. Microsoft mice aren t listed either in a review for mice recommended for Linux laptops:

https://www.addictivetips.com/buying-gui...use-linux/

Matthew Higgins said on his Youtube channel, he has no time left for further PinePhone tests until the end of his PhD thesis, so we have to do the tests ourselfes.

[Peter Gamma]

Today I bought a "Logitech M557 Bluetooth Wireless Mouse".  On sale for $19.99 otherwise $24.99.  Works fine.
I also have an old Motorola BT mouse (nothing special) which works just as well.

I'd venture to say the "Logitech Pebble 350 Bluetooth Mouse" or "Logitech Bluetooth Pebble Mouse M350" (both $24.99) would work.
If you're anywhere you can find these models give them a try. 

As a side note, remember you can have only one connected at a time, unlike with the wired/dongle/receiver mice.

Can you confirm that your Logitech M557 Bluetooth Wireless Mouse is still usable with the PinePhone? I first also thought that my Elecom is stable, but then it disconnected several time. I did not yet check the time how long it is stable. I wonder why there is no demo of a PinePhone with a Bluetooth mouse?

In the Ubuntu Touch forum, I found this frightening statement:

kugiigi 19 Mar 2022, 05:20 in the Ubuntu Touch forum:

«Bluetooth is a miss and hit in UT unfortunately. In my experience, any BLE or higher than BT 3.0 have issues»

Is there no success story of a long-term Bluetooth mouse user with a PinePhone?

[Peter Gamma]

But "the Microsoft Bluetooth Mouse" works also with Macs. iDevices, all the pinephone distros I've tried.

Did you also a disto hopping through all PinePhone distros which are available? I did it to find the best distro to install LibreOffice, you did it to check all distros to test those with your Microsoft Bluetooth mouse. So we are experts who did a great job. But what is the conclusion? To buy a "Microsoft Bluetooth Mouse", after you tested all the PinePhone distros with the mouse? You are a kind of expert, I have to admit.

But here are recommendations of two other experts and experienced Ubports Forum posters:

https://forums.ubports.com/topic/2318/kn...onvergence

They recommend two Logitech mice. I suppose they should also be a recommendation for other PinePhone distros. So we are on track to recommend a mouse for the PinePhone.

[pifou]

Hi Peter,

I can confirm the Logitech M557 works reliably and it doesn't disconnect when using both Mobian (uSD) and PostmarketOS (eMMC).

However, there's quite a catch here with BT:  the only BT device connected is the mouse.

I used the PP keyboard case [PPKC] as a keyboard.  I could never get two BT devices to work at the same time.
If I try to use a BT keyboard and a BT mouse I only get one of them working.  To do so reliably I have to power one or the other off, then remove and re-add the device I want to use.  After that all is fine for that single device, be it a keyboard or a mouse.
  The even worse part is that the PPKC stopped working (at all in Mobian) properly (no Fn top row symbols in PostmarketOS) with both OSes after they were upgaded to versions without the kb151 kernel module.
Now I have to choose if I want either a BT mouse or a BT keyboard but not both.
It doesn't matter if I attach the PPKC or not, the bad behaviour remains as above.
There is no need for a custom driver for the keyboard or mouse.
I tried two functional (they work fine with Android) BT keyboards in the above tests.

My conclusion: I think the brand doesn't matter but to get any BT HID device working, the phone needs to know only about a single device at a time.

[Peter Gamma]

Thanks for sharing this, pifou, this is very helpful information.

I miss a mouse next to the Pinephone keyboard? Which device to choose? The best way if someone has a configuration which he tested and confirm that it works.

But with devices like the Pinephone, the Orange Pi 5 or the Radxa Ze­ro it is important to know
which devices work.

- The Orange Pi 5 works only with 2.4 GHz keyboard and mice with it’s own dongle, for instance with a Rii mini 4.

- Pinephone developer Martijn Braam attaches a Lenovo ThinkPad Red Point usb keyboard with integrated track pad to the Pinephone dock, a configuration which works. But do usb keyboards with separate mouse not work, and he has chosen this keyboard because of this?

- And mikeb says his usb mouse isn't working when a PP keyboard is attached:

https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?...ight=mouse

- Programmer Roberto Alsina has built a laptop from a Radxa Zero:

https://ralsina.me/weblog/posts/so-i-bui...aptop.html

His laptop looks like a 40 years TRS80.He uses a mechanical keyboard which is connected over usb-c:

https://lyselectrohogar.com.ar/producto/...-ganon-65/


Did Bluetooth not work with the Radxa Zero?