Auto-Hide Mouse Pointer in Ubuntu When Idle

By , Published June 17, 2010

Simple things are no-less crazily awesome just take Unclutter which auto-hides your cursor from the screen after a timed period of inactivity.

So popular is Unclutter that it's being reviewed for inclusion in Ubuntu 10.10!

Why would I want to use this?

How many people instinctively move their mouse-cursor off-screen when needing to work, read or do something? Perhaps you're working on a text document and don't need the mouse being on screen, you might be watching a video on YouTube or working in a terminal. Any time the mouse is left idle for a user-set period of time (5 secs, etc) the mouse cursor disappears.

Install Unclutter in Ubuntu

image

Launch Unclutter

Press ALT+F2 in unison and type 'Unclutter'. Your mouse cursor will hide after 5 seconds of inactivity. To set it to something different see the list of switches on the Unclutter man page (think wiki) @ http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/hardy/man1/unclutter.1.html

Thanks to Greg Nicholson on the Ayatana Mailing list

Article originally appeared on omgubuntu.co.uk

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  • Bill

    nice find. thx

    • Dave Twodogs

      Does it autostart when I reboot or do I have to add to ‘startup applications?’

      • http://dieki.myopenid.com/ Dieki

        You have to add it manually.

  • http://myinterestingubuntu.blogspot.com/ heepie

    Sometimes the best ideas are the simplest…

    • daas88

      I’m always moving the cursor out of the way, this is a great idea!

  • https://launchpad.net/~xraya4t XRayA4T

    It should be a lowercase ‘u’ : Press ALT+F2 in unison and type ‘unclutter’

  • http://twitter.com/Ryu_Kurisu Christiaan Druif

    Too bad actually that for something that is standard in Windows needs a seperate program in Linux.
    It’s also a shame that the cursor doesn’t disappears when you’re writing.

    • daas88

      standard in windows? I have windows7 and the mouse cursor doesn’t autohide…

    • http://twitter.com/Sephiroth_VII Sephiroth_VII

      Unless you’re using some super-early version of Windows 8, something is wrong with your mouse :-s

    • Anonymous

      I have Windows XP and I used to use Windows 7 RC, and neither of them did that..

      Also, my cursor DOES disappear when I’m writing, and I’m using Lucid.

    • http://dieki.myopenid.com/ Dieki

      Hm… an idiot troll AND three of us took it.
      Perhaps Christiaan Druif should realize that _everything_ is a separate program in Linux.

  • http://olympusdigitalpen.blogspot.com/ dr. watson

    Hmm, I’m all about a clutter free desktop, but installing a package just to hide a mouse pointer seems a bit absurd to me.

  • Anonymous

    I use dual monitors, and when I run unclutter it only hides the mouse pointer when it’s on the left screen. When it’s on my right monitor it stays around. Is there any way to run unclutter on both monitors instead of just one?

  • http://twitter.com/Asheyna Chelle

    Yeah let’s include stuff like this… who needs audio that consistently works? Meh… MY mouse moves off screen by itself!

  • http://twitter.com/stewieX One Geek To Another

    Great feature. This should definitely be added to 10.10.

  • Tito

    On my machine, unclutter starts automatically on boot up. The problem is that the delay time is reduced to 1 sec.
    I tried to find it in startup applications but it’s not there. How do I remove it from startup so that I can manually run it with different parameters?

    • Isaac

      I have the same issue on my HP dv5t series laptop. I had to manually kill the process (pkill unclutter in the terminal) and add it to Startup Applications…I’m hoping it works (haven’t rebooted yet).

      • las

        use sudo dpkg-reconfigure unclutter .You will be asked for enabling @ startup

  • Lazar

    I really like unclutter, but I have a problem.

    When I’m playing hedgewars the cursor is moving by itself! So I have to kill unclutter in order to play the game.

    Any similar problems or a solution?

    All is happening on Kubuntu 10.04

  • Anonymous

    I installed it, at first liked, but with the use I’m hating it. The idea is great, but it dont works right. The mouse should be invisible, not changed position, Actually it get invisible, but, first it have a move. For example, for previewing a song letting the mouse over it, it will not just stop the music when it disappears and reappears, but also replay now with the mouse hidden.
    I belive that if unclutter gets inside xwindow, it could be better handled then a third party application controlling mouse.

    • http://www.google.com/profiles/110067375901855465830 Ben

      I’d have to agree.

      You might think it’s a good idea, but it really gets annoying if you use the cursor a lot. Maybe if the delay was longer (like, 3 to 5 seconds) it would be okay, but as it is I hate it. Plus, it creates a visual inconsistency (the cursor is still there, just not…”there”), so when you go to move the cursor again you’re never quite sure where to expect it.

      • Anonymous

        I removed here. It is too imature to be usable. Istead of disapping it should get less opaque, and comes with a config menu, to change opaque and time.

  • Anonymous

    I installed it, at first liked, but with the use I’m hating it. The idea is great, but it dont works right. The mouse should be invisible, not changed position, Actually it get invisible, but, first it have a move. For example, for previewing a song letting the mouse over it, it will not just stop the music when it disappears and reappears, but also replay now with the mouse hidden.
    I belive that if unclutter gets inside xwindow, it could be better handled then a third party application controlling mouse.

  • Strycore

    If you install unclutter, you’ll soon wonder why your video games acts strangely, why you can’t read on hover text anymore and your mouse seems on drugs. Please run the ‘apt-get source unclutter’ command and open the README file. You will see by yourself that this program does unnatural thing and wants to own your Xorg.

  • Guy Stalnaker

    YAY! I knew this page existed as I’ve used it in the past to do auto-hiding of the cursor. And here I am using it a year after you wrote it. Well done and thanks for keeping the page around!