A Linux utility that converts horizontal mouse scroll wheel events to touchpad two-finger swipe gestures, enabling applications like Firefox and Chromium to recognise them as back/forward navigation, and desktop environments to use them for workspace switching.

Note: This project is mainly written by LLM, use with caution.

Applications like Firefox and Chromium interpret two-finger horizontal swipes on touchpads as back/forward navigation. Desktop environments like GNOME and KDE use them for workspace switching. However, none of these recognise horizontal scroll wheel events from mice. The Microsoft All-in-One Media Keyboard has a horizontal scroll wheel that generates these events, so WheelSwipe bridges the gap.

1. Exclusively grabs the input device via EVIOCGRAB, blocking its events from the rest of the system
2. Creates a virtual mouse (V-Mouse) and forwards all non-horizontal-scroll events to it
3. Creates a virtual touchpad (V-Touch) and converts REL_HWHEEL_HI_RES events to two-finger horizontal swipes using MT Protocol B; REL_HWHEEL events are ignored to prevent duplicates

• Linux with uinput support
• Root privileges (for device access)
• GCC

make

cat /proc/bus/input/devices
# or
sudo evtest

sudo ./wheelswipe /dev/input/eventX

sudo env IDLE_TIMEOUT_MS=300 SCROLL_TO_PIXEL_RATIO=-2 ./wheelswipe /dev/input/event7

Invalid values produce a warning and fall back to the default.

Create /etc/systemd/system/wheelswipe.service:

[Unit]
Description=WheelSwipe - horizontal scroll to gesture converter
After=multi-user.target

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/wheelswipe /dev/input/eventX
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=5
Environment="IDLE_TIMEOUT_MS=500"
Environment="SCROLL_TO_PIXEL_RATIO=-1"

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Then:

sudo cp wheelswipe /usr/local/bin/
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now wheelswipe

Note: The event device path may change on reboot. Consider using udev rules for a stable path.

Permission denied — run with sudo.

Wrong device — use sudo evtest to confirm the device generates REL_HWHEEL_HI_RES events.

Gestures not recognised — ensure gesture support is enabled in your desktop environment or browser. Try adjusting SCROLL_TO_PIXEL_RATIO for sensitivity or increasing IDLE_TIMEOUT_MS if gestures are cut short.

Events not blocked — ensure no other program is grabbing the device.