the pivot effect with tft screens using ubuntu

Ever wanted to rotate your computer screen because a word document didn’t fit on a page? That’s now possible, if you’re the owner of a TFT screen with pivot function. It comes in quite handy if you’re reading an E-Book with a rather high resolution (e.g 120%). You won’t have to scroll to the end of the page, until the next page starts.

The best way to use the pivot function, provided that you have a Nvidia graphic card, is to install the restricted nvidia driver on ubuntu (this works smoothly on Ubuntu Feisty (6.04) and Ubuntu Gutsy (6.10)) - if you’re still using edgy you have to find the right driver for your kernel version.

After installing the restricted driver you have to open the xorg.conf file (located in /etc/X11/) - but heads up, ALWAYS backup your xorg.conf before you start editing….if you’re using an editor like Kate, then you’re on the safe side, because Kate automatically generates a backup file.

There’s a section called “screen” - you have to add the following line:

Option “RandRRotation” “yes”

Here’s an example, what my xorg.conf file looks like:

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Default Screen”
Device “nVidia Corporation C51PV [GeForce 6150]“
Monitor “Standardbildschirm”
Option “RandRRotation” “yes”
Defaultdepth 24
EndSection

After editing your xorg.conf file, save it and then restart the X-server by pressing Ctrl+Alt+Backspace

If you don’t have any major problems after restarting the X-server, then you can either open a terminal and use the following commands to rotate your screen

# to rotate the screen to the left:
xrandr -o left

# to rotate the screen to the default orientation:
xrandr -o normal

# to rotate the screen to the right:
xrandr -o right

The 2nd way, if you’re using the KDE window manager, is to go into the system settings, selecting the Monitor and Display module, and then there’s a box on the left hand side, saying “Monitor Orientation” - normal, left edge on top, right edge on top or upside down - check the following screenshot:

You can select either of this options, don’t be skeptical if there’s a huge black bar on your screen - you probably just need to restart the X-server again (ctrl+alt+backspace) and then you’re set.

Enjoy your new pivot screen now!