[SOLVED] Lock keyboard and mouse while running xdtool commands through a sh script

Lock keyboard and mouse while running xdtool commands through a sh script

Consider the following illustrative sh script which uses xdtool to open a new tab in the terminal, change it to tab 1, and then write "Hello world":

#!/bin/sh
cd ${0%/*} || exit 1 # run from this directory

xdotool key ctrl+shift+t                                   #Open new terminal tab

xdotool key alt+1                                          #Switch to the tab 1 of the terminal

xdotool type "echo \"Hello world\""                        #Write something

xdotool key Return                                         #Press "Enter"

If I write something or click the mouse button somewhere else while the script is running, the text "Hello world" may be written where I clicked, mingled with the letters that I typed in the keyboard. I would like to lock the keyboard and mouse while the xdotool commands are executed so that this can't happen. Perhaps there's a xdotool option for that purpose, although I didn't find any. Do you have any suggestions?

Solution

first type xinput in terminal to list the devices. Then Select the ID of the device that you want to disable. Add lines to your script as follows:

#!/bin/sh

export DISPLAY=:0
xinput set-int-prop $ID "Device Enabled" 8 0

cd ${0%/*} || exit 1 # run from this directory

xdotool key ctrl+shift+t                                   #Open new terminal tab

xdotool key alt+1                                          #Switch to the tab 1 of    the terminal

xdotool type "echo \"Hello world\""                        #Write something

 xinput set-int-prop $ID "Device Enabled" 8 1

xdotool key Return