Raspberry Pi OS mouse movement script

Searched on March 29, 2025 at 10:09 am

It appears you're looking for information on how to create a script to control mouse movements on a Raspberry Pi. Here's a breakdown of how you can achieve this, along with some considerations:

Methods for Mouse Movement

Several libraries can be used to control mouse movement in Python on a Raspberry Pi:

Example Script (using pyautogui)

While the search results don't provide a complete, ready-to-use script, they do allude to the necessary components. Here's an example of how you might use pyautogui (note: you may need to install it first via pip install pyautogui):

import pyautogui
import time

try:
    while True:
        # Get the current mouse position
        x, y = pyautogui.position()
        print(f"Mouse is at: {x}, {y}")

        # Move the mouse to a new location (e.g., 100 pixels to the right, 50 down)
        pyautogui.moveRel(100, 50, duration=0.25)  # Move relative to current position

        time.sleep(2) # pause for 2 seconds

        #Move it back
        pyautogui.moveRel(-100, -50, duration = 0.25)
        time.sleep(2)

except KeyboardInterrupt:
    print("Script stopped")

Explanation:

  1. Import Libraries: Imports the pyautogui library for mouse control and the time library for pausing the script.
  2. Get Mouse Position: Obtains the current coordinates of the mouse pointer.
  3. Move Mouse: Uses pyautogui.moveRel() to move the mouse pointer relative to its current position. The duration argument specifies the time it takes to move the mouse.
  4. Error Handling: The try...except block allows the user to terminate the script using Ctrl+C.

Considerations and Troubleshooting

  • Permissions: You might need root privileges to control input devices. Try running your script with sudo forums.raspberrypi.com.
  • Virtual Environments: If you are using a virtual environment, make sure that the necessary libraries (pynput, pyautogui, mouse) are installed within that environment stackoverflow.com.
  • Troubleshooting pyautogui: If pyautogui doesn't work, ensure python3-xlib is installed: sudo apt-get install python3-xlib.
  • Purpose: Consider what you're trying to achieve with mouse movement. For example, you might want to prevent the screen from going to sleep gist.github.com.

Making the Mouse Movement Useful

  • Avoiding Screen Sleep: You can create a script that subtly moves the mouse periodically to prevent inactivity timeouts gist.github.com.

    raspberrypi.com

  • GPIO Control: You can connect buttons to the Raspberry Pi's GPIO pins and use them to control mouse movement in specific directions forums.raspberrypi.com.

    electronicwings.com

  • Automated Tasks: You could automate GUI-based tasks by moving the mouse and clicking on specific screen elements.

Running at Boot

If you want your script to run automatically when the Raspberry Pi boots, you can add it to the autostart file raspberrypi.stackexchange.com. The specific file may vary depending on your desktop environment.

To automatically run a Python script on boot, add the following line to /etc/rc.local (make sure to edit the file as root, e.g., sudo nano /etc/rc.local) before the exit 0 line:

sudo python /path/to/your/script.py &

Replace /path/to/your/script.py with the actual path to your Python script. The & runs the script in the background.

githubusercontent.com

Hiding the Mouse Pointer

While the initial query mentioned moving the mouse pointer to the corner of the screen, another option is to hide it altogether forums.raspberrypi.com. However, simply hiding it might not prevent "hover-over" effects on web pages.

python.org