Fix a Linux fingerprint sensor by rewriting its driver

A Redditor had Gemini 4 Argon in Antigravity patch the Elan fingerprint driver on an IdeaPad running CachyOS; in about five minutes the sensor worked about as well as on Windows.

Done withGemini· Oct 24, 2026

What they did

The poster, u/FNX996, had never got the fingerprint reader on their Lenovo IdeaPad to work under any Linux distribution. Enrolling a finger sometimes succeeded, but the sensor then failed to match or switched off too quickly, and earlier models had not solved it. On CachyOS they first used Gemini Flash 3.8 to write a prompt, then gave it to Gemini 4 Argon running in Google's Antigravity coding agent at medium reasoning. The agent rewrote the Elan sensor driver, added a script meant to keep the patched driver from being replaced by kernel updates, and walked the poster through enrolling the fingerprint again.

How it went

The poster says it took about five minutes and the reader now works practically the same as it does on Windows. They do not say what was changed in the driver, and there are no follow-up reports yet on whether the fix survives a kernel update.

Worth knowing

Antigravity is not in our agent list, so this is tagged Gemini. A hand-patched driver that a script keeps in place after kernel updates is something to review before you trust it, and worth keeping a backup of the stock module so you can roll back.

Try it

With Gemini· 4 parts to fill in

My [laptop model] running [Linux distribution and kernel version] has a [sensor vendor] fingerprint reader that [what fails, e.g. enrolls but never matches]. Find out which driver and libfprint version handle it, read the logs while I try to enroll and verify, and work out why it fails. Back up the stock driver first. Then propose a patch, explain what it changes, and wait for my approval before you build or install anything. After installing, help me re-enroll a finger and test it. If the fix needs to survive kernel updates, write a hook or script for that and show it to me before enabling it. Stop when verification works ten times in a row or tell me what you could not fix.

Square brackets are the parts to fill in. The prompt is ours; the story is theirs.

Where they said it

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