Public bug reported:

I am running Ubuntu on a Macbook Pro. The trackpad was working out-of-
the box, but it didn't run quite as smooth as it could. My palm wouldn't
be recognised while typing and when I would use two-finger scrolling my
two fingers would get recognised as three fingers here and there (when
they get to a poistion more parallel to the trackpad, with the largest
finger area touching it) which would cause quite a few accidental
clicks, windows misbehaves (as the 3-finger click and drag somehow
switches windows by default in ginn) etc.

As a result, I had to find out about synclient and the settings it
offers. This blog post helped me a lot

http://uselessuseofcat.com/?p=74

What proved to work for me is
 - palm detection on
 - MaxFinger 50

I set this by creating an /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/60-synaptics.conf with
the following contents:

Section "InputClass"
  Identifier "touchpad"
  Driver "synaptics"
  MatchIsTouchpad "on"
  MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*"
  Option "PalmDetect" "on"
  Option "FingerHigh" "50"
EndSection

I think these (or close to these) settings should be set as the default
in Ubuntu for Macbook trackpads. If not, they should at least be
accessible in the mouse & touchpad menu in the control center to save
others from the same pains. Also, the sensitivity option in the control
center is not doing anything - only the acceleration slider has any
effect.

It would be great if Apple trackpads would be tweaked to work more
nicely in Ubuntu, as I think this is (with also maybe multi-monitor
handling and battery life) the only remaining big reason not to switch
from OS X to Ubuntu on Apple hardware. This is a problem many users are
facing, which can be seen from the 20 "thank you" comments on the
aforementioned blog post (I can only imagine how many other people went
back to their OS X without bothering to search tech blogs to tweak their
drivers). There are some nice projects out there, such as Touchegg and
Ginn, but even after playing with compiling the source, Touchegg it is
still very difficult to get running in Ubuntu. What I'm trying to say
is, there are recipes and separate projects out there and it would be
great if someone with a wider grasp of the technologies involved
collected the best parts and integrated them in future Ubuntu packages.
Especially now, that Ubuntu is spreading towards other touch-aware
devices such as tablets :)

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.10
Package: xserver-xorg-input-synaptics 1.6.2-1ubuntu5
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.5.0-21.32-generic 3.5.7.1
Uname: Linux 3.5.0-21-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.6.1-0ubuntu9
Architecture: amd64
Date: Sat Dec 29 01:11:55 2012
DistUpgraded: Fresh install
DistroCodename: quantal
DistroVariant: ubuntu
InstallationDate: Installed on 2012-10-19 (70 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.10 "Quantal Quetzal" - Release amd64 (20121017.5)
MachineType: Apple Inc. MacBookPro8,1
MarkForUpload: True
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.5.0-21-generic 
root=UUID=a6e1c62c-32e8-473f-8813-2ca9ad27b059 ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7
SourcePackage: xserver-xorg-input-synaptics
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 01/24/12
dmi.bios.vendor: Apple Inc.
dmi.bios.version: MBP81.88Z.0047.B27.1201241646
dmi.board.asset.tag: Base Board Asset Tag#
dmi.board.name: Mac-94245B3640C91C81
dmi.board.vendor: Apple Inc.
dmi.board.version: MacBookPro8,1
dmi.chassis.type: 10
dmi.chassis.vendor: Apple Inc.
dmi.chassis.version: Mac-94245B3640C91C81
dmi.modalias: 
dmi:bvnAppleInc.:bvrMBP81.88Z.0047.B27.1201241646:bd01/24/12:svnAppleInc.:pnMacBookPro8,1:pvr1.0:rvnAppleInc.:rnMac-94245B3640C91C81:rvrMacBookPro8,1:cvnAppleInc.:ct10:cvrMac-94245B3640C91C81:
dmi.product.name: MacBookPro8,1
dmi.product.version: 1.0
dmi.sys.vendor: Apple Inc.
version.compiz: compiz 1:0.9.8.4+bzr3412-0ubuntu0.1
version.ia32-libs: ia32-libs 20090808ubuntu36
version.libdrm2: libdrm2 2.4.39-0ubuntu1
version.libgl1-mesa-dri: libgl1-mesa-dri 9.0-0ubuntu1
version.libgl1-mesa-dri-experimental: libgl1-mesa-dri-experimental N/A
version.libgl1-mesa-glx: libgl1-mesa-glx 9.0-0ubuntu1
version.xserver-xorg-core: xserver-xorg-core 2:1.13.0-0ubuntu6.1
version.xserver-xorg-input-evdev: xserver-xorg-input-evdev 1:2.7.3-0ubuntu2
version.xserver-xorg-video-ati: xserver-xorg-video-ati 
1:6.99.99~git20120913.8637f772-0ubuntu1
version.xserver-xorg-video-intel: xserver-xorg-video-intel 2:2.20.9-0ubuntu2
version.xserver-xorg-video-nouveau: xserver-xorg-video-nouveau 1:1.0.2-0ubuntu3

** Affects: xserver-xorg-input-synaptics (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New


** Tags: amd64 apport-bug quantal running-unity ubuntu

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1094389

Title:
  Default synaptics settings not the best for Apple trackpads

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