libinput and tablet proximity handling

This is merely an update on the current status quo, if you read this post in a year's time some of the details may have changed

libinput provides an API to handle graphics tablets, i.e. the tablets that are used by artists. The interface is based around tools, each of which can be in proximity at any time. "Proximity" simply means "in detectable range". libinput promises that any interaction is framed by a proximity in and proximity out event pair, but getting to this turned out to be complicated. libinput has seen a few changes recently here, so let's dig into those. Remember that proverb about seeing what goes into a sausage? Yeah, that.

In the kernel API, the proximity events for pens are the BTN_TOOL_PEN bit. If it's 1, we're in proximity, if it's 0, we're out of proximity. That's the theory.

Wacom tablets (or rather the kernel driver) always reset all axes on proximity out. So libinput needs to take care not to send a 0 value to the caller, lest you want a jump to the top left corner every time you move the pen away from the tablet. Some Wacom pens have serial numbers and we use those to uniquely identify a tool. But some devices start sending proximity and axis events before we get the serial numbers which means we can't identify the tool until several ms later. In that case we simply discard the serial. This means we cannot uniquely identify those pens but so far no-one has complained.

A bunch of tablets (HUION) don't have proximity at all. For those, we start getting events and then stop getting events, without any other information. So libinput has a timer - if we don't get events for a given time, we force a proximity out. Of course, this means we also need to force a proximity in when the next event comes in. These tablets are common enough that recently we just enabled the proximity timeout for all tablets. Easier than playing whack-a-mole, doubly so because HUION re-uses USD ids so you can't easily identify them anyway.

Some tablets (HP Spectre 13) have proximity but never send it. So they advertise the capability, just don't generate events for it. Same handling as the ones that don't have proximity at all.

Some tablets (HUION) have proximity, but only send it once per plug-in, after that it's always in proximity. Since libinput may start after the first pen interaction, this means we have to a) query the initial state of the device and b) force proximity in/out based on the timer, just like above.

Some tablets (Lenovo Flex 5) sometimes send proximity out events, but sometimes do not. So for those we have a timer and forced proximity events, but only when our last interaction didn't trigger a proximity event.

The Dell Active Pen always sends a proximity out event, but with a delay of ~200ms. That timeout is longer than the libinput timeout so we'll get a proximity out event, but only after we've already forced proximity out. We can just discard that event.

The Dell Canvas pen (identifies as "Wacom HID 4831 Pen") can have random delays of up to ~800ms in its event reporting. Which would trigger forced proximity out events in libinput. Luckily it always sends proximity out events, so we could quirk out to specifically disable the timer.

The HP Envy x360 sends a proximity in for the pen, followed by a proximity in from the eraser in the next event. This is still an unresolved issue at the time of writing.

That's the current state of things, I'm sure it'll change in a few months time again as more devices decide to be creative. They are artist's tools after all.

The lesson to take away here: all of the above are special cases that need to be implemented but this can only be done on demand. There's no way any one person can test every single device out there and testing by vendors is often nonexistent. So if you want your device to work, don't complain on some random forum, file a bug and help with debugging and testing instead.