Move Mouse

From awesome

If you (like me) work (mostly) mouselessly then the mouse pointer in the centre of the screen is an irritation. Add this to your rc.lua to move the mouse out of the way.

-- set the desired pixel coordinates:
--  if your screen is 1024x768 the this line sets the bottom right.
local safeCoords = {x=1024, y=768}
--  this line sets top middle(ish).
local safeCoords = {x=512, y=0}
-- Flag to tell Awesome whether to do this at startup.
local moveMouseOnStartup = true

-- Simple function to move the mouse to the coordinates set above.
local function moveMouse(x_co, y_co)
    mouse.coords({ x=x_co, y=y_co })
end

-- Bind ''Meta4+Ctrl+m'' to move the mouse to the coordinates set above.
--   this is useful if you needed the mouse for something and now want it out of the way
keybinding({ modkey, "Control" }, "m", function() moveMouse(safeCoords.x, safeCoords.y) end):add()

-- Optionally move the mouse when rc.lua is read (startup)
if moveMouseOnStartup then
        moveMouse(safeCoords.x, safeCoords.y)
end

This could probably be improved by detecting the screen resolution and setting "safeCoords" accordingly.

For another option, which doesn't move the cursor but temporarily hides it after a period of inactivity, and also offers the ability to instantly hide the cursor while typing, you could try the program 'unclutter'. Available in Debian, Ubuntu and possibly other distros.