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Operating System Specific Discussions => MorphOS => MorphOS -- Application questions and support => Topic started by: commodorejohn on August 08, 2013, 11:22:19 PM

Title: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 08, 2013, 11:22:19 PM
So I nabbed myself an Aluminum Powerbook on the cheap (15" 1.25GHz, 1GB RAM) and figured I'd give MOS a shot since I was going to have to do a fresh install in any case (previous owner, this was not hardware well-suited for Leopard.) It installed nicely and runs fine, but I'm having a couple issues. The big problem is that it doesn't seem to believe that it has a touchpad, and thinks there's a mouse connected instead. This wouldn't be too much of a problem except that Powerbooks have no right button, and since it doesn't think it has a touchpad it won't use the provided touchpad workarounds, which means I'm having to rely on IControl's keyboard shortcut to bring up menus. Other issues are that the keyboard controls for things like brightness and volume don't work either, and Chrysalis loaded up a bunch of stupid crap in the title bar that I can't figure out how to get rid of, and installed an ugly icon pack that I'm not sure how to revert from.

Anybody got any advice on getting this stuff sorted out?
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: ChaosLord on August 09, 2013, 12:12:58 AM
If you plug a real Mouse in then the RMB will work, right?
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 09, 2013, 12:24:35 AM
Yes, right button works on a USB mouse. Kinda defeats the purpose of a laptop though.

Additional issue: it doesn't seem to go into sleep mode when I close the lid.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: nicholas on August 09, 2013, 10:31:56 AM
1. Format, reinstall, don't install Chrysalis again.
2) Option- Left click for RMB same as on OSX.
3. Install Grunch and use it to install the software you want.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 09, 2013, 06:00:06 PM
Hmm...I thought I tried option-click, but I'll give it another shot.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 10, 2013, 11:03:07 PM
Well, I reformatted and installed MOS without Chrysalis (had to re-partition to set up an OSX install anyway.) Still no luck getting it to realize it's using a touchpad, but I got option-click working by simply adding a "hotkey" for it in the system settings.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: kickstart on August 10, 2013, 11:30:54 PM
@commodorejohn

I have a compatible powerbook but trackpad never worked under morphos, i need to use a usb mouse, keyboard retroillumination doenst work too, after many installations with and without dual boot and same result.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 10, 2013, 11:56:58 PM
Huh. I'd like to know why they bothered to include a trackpad settings page if it's not going to use them... :|
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: zylesea on August 11, 2013, 01:24:22 AM
Quote from: commodorejohn;744053


Additional issue: it doesn't seem to go into sleep mode when I close the lid.


There's no real sleep mode in MorphOS, but should switch off the display though when lid closed.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 11, 2013, 02:19:31 AM
That doesn't really help much, when it's still burning battery from the CPU idling - and it's not a good situation heat-wise, either.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: nicholas on August 11, 2013, 02:45:24 AM
Quote from: commodorejohn;744288
Huh. I'd like to know why they bothered to include a trackpad settings page if it's not going to use them... :|


What model of Powerbook are you using?

I have a 5,8 and the trackpad works properly. Two finger tap for right click etc.

There are two possibilities here:

1) Your trackpad is broken
2) There is a bug in MorphOS that affects your particular model

My advice is:

1) Send a subscribe email to the official MorphOS mailing list morphos-subscribe@ml.morphos-team.net
2) Go to #morphos channel on freenode and ask for help
3) Register an account at http://morphzone.info and ask for advice
4) If after all that you can't get it to work properly and believe it to be a bug in MorphOS then:
Quote

When you are looking at the Ambient desktop, move your mouse pointer to the screen title bar and select the menu column labelled as "Ambient". Now, choose "About MorphOS" and view the "Support" tab. Read the on-screen instructions and fill out a report. Finally, press the "Generate report" button

Taken from: http://www.morphos.de/faq
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 11, 2013, 02:52:42 AM
The trackpad works fine in OSX, so I doubt it's a problem with the hardware. I'll ask around.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: nicholas on August 11, 2013, 03:14:17 AM
Quote from: commodorejohn;744303
The trackpad works fine in OSX, so I doubt it's a problem with the hardware. I'll ask around.


Well you really should go through the official channels as listed below so that an official bug ticket can be created and then get the issue fixed for the release of MOS 3.3 (which is apparently due very soon.)
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: Kronos on August 11, 2013, 09:36:43 AM
1.25GHz suggest an older PowerBook (one of those only supported since 3.2), these have ADB keyboards and trackpad which brings some problem compared to USB variants used in PB5.6-5.9
a) left and right "command"/"Amiga" key send the same keycode
b) no support for 2 finger gestures on the trackpad

a) same issue applies for all iBooks (last models have the 2 finger USB trackpad, but all have ADB keyboards), I worked around this issue by reassigning some shortcuts to ALT -.... instead of LAMIGA-...

b) AFAIR there were some attempts to trick around this issue, but not sure what ever came of it (don't have anything with ADB-trackpad here)
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 11, 2013, 09:20:53 PM
I can do without 2-finger gestures now that I've got option-click working, but it'd really be nice for tap-click at least to work...
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: nicholas on August 11, 2013, 09:25:39 PM
Quote from: commodorejohn;744363
I can do without 2-finger gestures now that I've got option-click working, but it'd really be nice for tap-click at least to work...


Have you reported it as a bug?  If not it won't get fixed.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on August 11, 2013, 09:43:43 PM
I'll get to that. I do have other things to do on a weekend, you know ;P

P.S. posting from OWB!
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: thaddaeus on September 12, 2013, 01:34:47 AM
Hi  i reda you are running morph os on your powerbook and had no no problems with installing it?  i today downloaded the latest version ( never tried morph before) and tried all soe
rtd of different ways of pressing the  c key down after the chime  . i spent hours doing this and  mac os x always started up . is there something obvious i am overlooking?  please tell me how you did your install .  i am usually pretty good at following directions . the help desk page said something about modifying teh boot script i have never had to do this with a mac .  i do ok with computers but im not really a computer guy i just draw pictures . lol. please help any advice would be appreciated .
burned  morph os disc on my imac and trying to install it on a powerboook g4 aluminium 17"

thank you  very much!
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on September 12, 2013, 03:00:28 AM
No, I didn't have any difficulties booting. If you are, there's a couple things I'd try. First off, boot into Open Firmware (hold down the Command/Apple key, O, and F while booting) and enter:
Quote
reset-nvram
reset-all
at the prompt to clear the NVRAM settings, then hold down C while it's rebooting. If it still won't boot from the CD, try booting into Open Firmware again and try:
Quote
boot cd:,\\tbxi
If that doesn't do it, I'd double-check that your CD image is good and burn a new copy.
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: nicholas on September 12, 2013, 01:04:49 PM
Are you sure you burned the iso correctly and didn't just copy the image to the CD?

Boot into OSX then check the contents of the CD. Does it contain just the iso image or have the expected filesystem structure? (MorphOS folder, C, Deva, Libs, S folders etc)
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: thaddaeus on September 12, 2013, 11:09:13 PM
thank you commadore john , i tried your suggestions and and none of them worked but i googled your suggested instructions and it kinda opened up a whole new world of stuff ive never played with . was up late trying to get cd to boot trying to boot from usb stick and finally gave up for the nite and started playing with setting times to run programs automatically thru the the terminal when imm asleep . overall i learned a lot last nite but didnt really get anything done lol
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: thaddaeus on September 12, 2013, 11:15:53 PM
nicholos this might be my problem i dont know . i just downloaded the morphos file and burned it to disk thru finder . i dont know if i burned it correctly or not . when i click on the morphos-3.2.iso file i can see classes and applications  boot.img  bootpeg1img ect ect  but how do i know if the disk i burned is just a datadisk or a bootable one (obviously its not booting lol) is tehre another way i should be burning my disk? another program besides finder?   thanks
Title: Re: MorphOS 3.2 on a Powerbook G4 - some issues
Post by: commodorejohn on September 12, 2013, 11:30:14 PM
Have you tried opening the CD itself (and not the ISO file) in Finder? It should be able to read it if it burned correctly.