Hide The Mouse Pointer on The ED-HMI Series Desktop System

1 Overview

Introduce the background and scope of hiding the mouse pointer on the ED-HMI series Desktop system.

1.1 Background

Some users operating on the ED-HMI series Desktop system wish to hide the mouse pointer to meet application requirements in different scenarios. In response to this demand, our company has developed a script to hide the mouse pointer, allowing users to hide the mouse pointer in appropriate scenarios.

1.2 Applicability

This application is applicable to all ED-HMI series products.

2 Configuration Guide

In Linux operating systems, the protocols and window architectures serving the graphical interface can be categorized into three types:

  • Wayfire : A window manager developed based on WLROOTS, which provides low-level functionality for communicating with the Wayland display server. Wayfire builds upon this to offer a highly customizable window management environment and is part of the Wayland ecosystem.
  • X11: The X Window System, a windowing system that not only defines the communication protocol between clients and servers but also provides a complete framework for window management and graphical rendering.
  • labwc: A Wayland compositor that constructs window composition and management functionalities based on the Wayland protocol. The compositor's primary task is to combine and display graphical content from application windows onto the screen. Labwc is a lightweight implementation among the many Wayland compositors.

For the X11, Wayfire, and labwc graphical interface protocols, the execution scripts to hide the mouse pointer differ, as outlined in the table below:

Graphical Interface ProtocolHide Mouse Script
labwclabwc_hide_mouse_cursor.sh
X11x11_hide_mouse_crusor.sh
Wayfirewayland_hide_mouse_cursor.sh

The following guide instructs users on how to hide the mouse pointer by executing different scripts when operating the Desktop system on ED-HMI series products.

2.1 Check the graphical interface protocol

Preparation:

  • The device has successfully booted into the desktop and is connected to the network.
  • No mouse is connected to the device’s USB port.

Steps:

  1. Open a terminal window on the system desktop and execute the following command.
  • If the return value is x11, it indicates the system is currently using the X11 protocol.
  • If the return value is wayland, it indicates the system is using either Wayfire or labwc (both part of the Wayland protocol ecosystem).
echo $XDG_SESSION_TYPE

115822

wer34131
  1. (Optional) the return value is wayland, proceed with the following command.
ps -ef | grep labwc
  • As shown in the example below, if the return value contains the content marked by the red box (e.g., labwc), the device’s graphical interface protocol is labwc.
  • As shown in the example below, if the return value does NOT contain the red-boxed content, the device’s graphical interface protocol is Wayfire. 41630

TIP

The factory-default graphical interface protocol for the ED-HMI series Desktop system is labwc.

2.2 Hide the Mouse Pointer

2.2.1 X11 Protocol

Preparation:

  • The system’s graphical interface protocol has been confirmed.

Steps:

  1. Obtain the execution script file: x11_hide_mouse_crusor.shopen in new window。
  2. Copy the downloaded script to any directory on the ED-HMI device via USB drive (or SSH remote login).
  3. Open a terminal window on the system desktop and run the following command to grant execution permissions.
sudo chmod +x x11_hide_mouse_crusor.sh
  1. Open a terminal window again and execute the script to hide the mouse pointer.
sudo ./x11_hide_mouse_crusor.sh
  1. After the script completes, the device screen will flicker briefly, and the mouse pointer will disappear.

2.2.2 Wayfire Protocol

Preparation:

  • The system’s graphical interface protocol has been confirmed.

Steps:

  1. Obtain the execution script file: wayland_hide_mouse_cursor.shopen in new window。
  2. Copy the downloaded script to any directory on the ED-HMI device via USB drive (or SSH remote login).
  3. Open a terminal window on the system desktop and run the following command to grant execution permissions.
sudo chmod +x wayland_hide_mouse_cursor.sh
  1. Open a terminal window again and execute the script to hide the mouse pointer.
sudo ./wayland_hide_mouse_cursor.sh
  1. After the script completes, the device screen will flicker briefly, and the mouse pointer will disappear.

2.2.3 labwc Protocol

Preparation:

  • The system’s graphical interface protocol has been confirmed.

Steps:

  1. Obtain the execution script file: labwc_hide_mouse_cursor.shopen in new window。
  2. Copy the downloaded script to any directory on the ED-HMI device via USB drive (or SSH remote login).
  3. Open a terminal window on the system desktop and run the following command to grant execution permissions.
sudo chmod +x labwc_hide_mouse_cursor.sh
  1. Open a terminal window again and execute the script to hide the mouse pointer.
sudo ./labwc_hide_mouse_cursor.sh

TIP

This script may take longer to complete due to the installation of compilation toolkits and cloning dependencies. If execution fails (likely due to network issues), contact our engineering team.

  1. After the script completes, the device screen will flicker briefly, and the mouse pointer will disappear.