For all those Linux users who envy Windows 7 ^[1] multi-touch, here is some good news. From now, Linux too has support for multi-touch just like windows. The multi-touch feature has been developed by the Interactive Computing Lab team in ENAC, France and has been introduced into the 2.6.30 Linux Kernel. See the video:

This feature is different from the multi-pointer feature ( available through MPX ) as it sends events directly from the Kernel and has support for gestures like swipe, dragging, water ripple on tap, pinch, resize, page flip etc . Inclusion in the core and the feature being a great one, assures it’s availability in any Linux distro using the 2.6.30 Kernel. There are hopes of it being included in Google Android as well.

According to the development page ^[2], the recognition code reads a raw input without any help from the X server and sends DBus messages to Compiz (the window manager) to convert the inputs into effects. All this was developed under the project ShareIT ^[3].

This is a full implementation of the capabilities of the new kernel initially explored by Luke Hutchison who implemented multi-touch on an Android G1 ^[4]using a hack.

With news of Linux capturing 1% of worldwide PC users surfacing a few months ago, it is really good to see such fast development in advanced areas. This will go a long way in establishing popular distros of Linux as good and free windows alternatives, if not competitors.