Input identifiers are not unique

[CaptainBloodz]

swaymsg -t get_version
sway version 1.0-rc1-31-gee56428b (Feb 7 2019, branch 'HEAD')

xwayland enabled

swaymsg -t get_inputs

Input device: USB OPTICAL MOUSE
  Type: Mouse
  Identifier: 10077:2982:USB_OPTICAL_MOUSE
  Product ID: 2982
  Vendor ID: 10077
  Libinput Send Events: enabled

Input device: USB HCT Keyboard
  Type: Mouse
  Identifier: 49395:673:USB_HCT_Keyboard
  Product ID: 673
  Vendor ID: 49395
  Libinput Send Events: enabled

Input device: USB HCT Keyboard
  Type: Keyboard
  Identifier: 49395:673:USB_HCT_Keyboard
  Product ID: 673
  Vendor ID: 49395
  Active Keyboard Layout: French
  Libinput Send Events: enabled

Input device: USB HCT Keyboard
  Type: Keyboard
  Identifier: 49395:673:USB_HCT_Keyboard
  Product ID: 673
  Vendor ID: 49395
  Active Keyboard Layout: French
  Libinput Send Events: enabled

Input device: Sleep Button
  Type: Keyboard
  Identifier: 0:3:Sleep_Button
  Product ID: 3
  Vendor ID: 0
  Active Keyboard Layout: English (US)
  Libinput Send Events: enabled
...

Is this replication:

1. Caused by some out of sway configuration?
2. Originated in sway behavior, whether expected or not?
3. Something else?

Plz note this isn't causing any issue he know of.

Thanks for your attention.

[RedSoxFan]

Related swaywm/wlroots#403

[emersion]

I think those are in the same group.

Related: swaywm/wlroots#1217

[Kimapr]

This causes me a problem. I can't configure my two RAPOO keyboard/mouse combos independently

[Zocker1999NET]

same here, I have a Thinkpad Tablet with a trackpoint and a touch pad. With libinput list-devices and libinput debug-events --device /dev/input/eventXX it was possible to distinguish them. However, sway cannot distinguish them

[Zocker1999NET]

This seems to be the code in question which generates the "unique" identifiers for each device:

sway/sway/input/input-manager.c

Lines 65 to 90 in 956b689

	char *input_device_get_identifier(struct wlr_input_device *device) {
	int vendor = device->vendor;
	int product = device->product;
	char *name = strdup(device->name ? device->name : "");
	strip_whitespace(name);
	char *p = name;
	for (; *p; ++p) {
	// There are in fact input devices with unprintable characters in its name
	if (*p == ' ' || !isprint(*p)) {
	*p = '_';
	}
	}
	const char *fmt = "%d:%d:%s";
	int len = snprintf(NULL, 0, fmt, vendor, product, name) + 1;
	char *identifier = malloc(len);
	if (!identifier) {
	sway_log(SWAY_ERROR, "Unable to allocate unique input device name");
	return NULL;
	}
	snprintf(identifier, len, fmt, vendor, product, name);
	free(name);
	return identifier;
	}

I thought about two ideas which could might solve this issue:

1. This code could be changed to fix this issue, however, without any workarounds, this would break current user configurations. And also, the new identifier needs to be stable so it keeps the same across multiple boots while trying to be unique. But I did not find any value, which could be added.
2. But, at least to distinguish between some devices, it could be added that we can describe, what capabilities the devices have (because they differ in my case) like in CSS, e.g. input:pointer[gesture], input:pointer[!gesture], and, if sway knows, maybe this could also be used to describe the port, where the device is connected (solving the issue with two identical keyboards connected). This change should be backward compatible to current configurations and could be expanded in the future, if required.

[Liriel]

counting the number of "unique" appearances of vendor:product:devicename combinations should provide a way to address a single device not breaking any configs

• Identifier: 6127:24709:PRIMAX_ThinkPad_X1_Tablet_Thin_Keyboard_Consumer_Control
• Identifier: 6127:24709:PRIMAX_ThinkPad_X1_Tablet_Thin_Keyboard_Consumer_Control_1

I realize of course that the order these are discoverd might not be the same each time, but I lived with that under X and it would be a dramatic improvement compared to not being able to adress a single device at all.

[tdaniel22]

Here's a VERY quick and dirty patch to set the USB physical connector name as the input identifier : https://gist.github.com/tdaniel22/166301c48a2e50502ba34877f509dcfb. I needed this to map two touch panels of the same brand to their respective outputs.