What is Edge Scrolling?
While using a mouse with a middle wheel, you can scroll up and down easily on lengthy web pages, documents, and about anywhere where there is an option for scrolling. On a laptop, there is an option to scroll up and down by using the extreme right edge of your touchpad. While this edge scrolling works fine for some, a few of you might find a real nuisance as it might mess up with your current view if you accidentally touch or swipe up and down on the right-hand side of the touchpad. Keeping the personal preferences of all users, Debian has kept this option customizable. You can enable/disable this feature through the Settings utility on the Debian graphical user interface.
In this article, we will explain how to enable/disable touchpad edge scrolling for your Debian laptop. You can replicate the procedure described in this article on a Debian 10 Buster system.
Using the Settings utility to enable/disable Edge scrolling
The Debian Settings utility lets you make many administrative changes and configurations to the system. One of them is customizing the way your mouse and touchpad behaves.
You can access the Settings either through the Application Launcher search as follows:
Or, click on the downward arrow located at the top-right corner of your Debian desktop and then click the settings icon from the following view:
The Settings utility opens in the view you were on when you last opened Settings. You need to click on the Devices tab, and then the Mouse & Touchpad in order to make the required configurations.
This is how the Mouse & Touchpad view looks like:
Alternatively, you can directly launch this view by entering relevant mouse and touchpad keywords in the Application Launcher, as follows:
In the Mouse & Touchpad settings view, try to locate the Edge Scrolling button under the Touchpad section. By default, this button is switched on Debian which means that the Edge Scrolling is enabled on your touchpad. Simply turn the button off in order to disable edge scrolling or turn it on in order to enable it. As soon as you do it, your new settings with take effect immediately. Some find this feature a blessing, and some just a nuisance. So whatever is your personal preference is, you can play with this button in the Settings utility to turn the feature off or on.
