Ubuntu
meta-kde package

thinkpad nvram nod read-enabled by default

Bug #31778 reported by drx
24
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
meta-kde (Ubuntu)
Fix Released
Medium
Kubuntu Bugs
Breezy
Invalid
Medium
Unassigned
Dapper
Invalid
Medium
Unassigned

Bug Description

The Thinkpad intergration of KDE (run kcontrol and see the module "IBM Thinkpad Notebook") needs read access to /dev/nvram

While the device is present on installation, the access right are:

crw-rw---- 1 root nvram 10, 144 2006-02-16 21:23 /dev/nvram

The control center module displays instructions on how to change the access rights to nvram with chmod, but after a reboot these changed rights are lost.

So at the moment it is needed to chmod the nvram device after every reboot.

Daniel Holbach (dholbach)
Changed in meta-kde:
status: Unconfirmed → Rejected
Kenny Duffus (kduffus)
Changed in meta-kde:
assignee: nobody → kubuntu-team
Dennis Kaarsemaker (dennis)
Changed in meta-kde:
status: Unconfirmed → Rejected
Revision history for this message
drx (drx) wrote : User must be in group "nvram"

I submitted this bug and found out: the user has to be in the group "nvram" to use this feature. This can be easily enabled through the user control panel. -- So the problem is not really the Thinkpad control panel, but the miles long list of groups that can be assigned to a user which is not explained. The default is even all groups unticked, which would not give a new user audio or opengl by default. I suggest to redesign this part.
Best greetings,
drx

Revision history for this message
Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton) wrote :

I don't think that the user has to be on that group, anymore. There's "thinkpad-keys" (from hotkey-setup) which is running as root, and it is working as a middle-man between the user and nvram. I have to double check, because I had a xosd-setup before and my uid is in nvram-group..

Revision history for this message
kibe (b-kix) wrote :

I can confirm this behaviour.
After a clean setup from dapper final (alternate CD), the rights of /dev/nvram is set to
crw-rw---- 1 root root 10, 144 2006-06-09 16:07 /dev/nvram
so one has to set chmod 666 on every reboot, because the setting is lost after reboot.

But maybe this is more likely a bug of hotkey-setup?

I edited the /etc/init.d/hotkey-setup to chmod 666 /dev/nvram after creation, but this ends up in starting kmix every time the kde boots up (weird!).

Revision history for this message
kibe (b-kix) wrote :

-> confirmed.
sorry, i have some problems in getting behind this launchpad thing...

Changed in meta-kde:
status: Unconfirmed → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Luis F. Lopez (luis.lopez) wrote :

Same issue seems to be also present on Kubuntu Edgy Knot.

Revision history for this message
Paul Sladen (sladen) wrote :

Jonathan wrote the kmilo-thinkpad plugin a while back. The idea in the future would be make KDE use the same infrastructure as GNOME and leave the thinkpad /dev/nvram key proxying to the lower-levels.

As noted by Timo above, this is started as root and therefore has (read) access to /dev/nvram, necessary to be able to produce the normal key presses.

Revision history for this message
Jonathan Riddell (jr) wrote :

The Generic plugin of KMilo in edgy now uses thinkpad-buttons or whatever else is sending keycodes.

Changed in meta-kde:
status: Confirmed → Fix Released
Revision history for this message
Paul Sladen (sladen) wrote :

Teh Rock!

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