Hi all,

I have a problem with a card reader for compact flash cards. It used to work alright, i.e. popped up in the device notifier and was then accessible within dolphin. But since a couple of weeks ago (don't know exactly when), it is not shown in the device notifier anymore when I plug it in.

I am using kde 4.3.3 on kubuntu 9.10 here, and just changed back to the device notifier without automout (the automount version was buggy), so this should not be the problem here.

The card is working fine, I can use it in the camera and transfer the images when connecting the camera via cable.

As additional information, tailf /var/log/messsages says

usb 1-3: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
usb 1-3: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
usbcore: registered new interface driver usb-storage
USB Mass Storage support registered.
scsi scan: INQUIRY result too short (35), using 36
scsi: unknown device type 30
scsi 4:0:0:0: Well-known LUN
PQ: 0 ANSI: 6
scsi 4:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 30



This output is not always the same, I also get stuff like


usb 1-3: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 4
usb 1-3: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
scsi5 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
scsi 5:0:0:0: Direct-Access Generic USB CF Reader 0.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2
scsi 5:0:0:1: Direct-Access Generic USB SD Reader 0.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2
scsi 5:0:0:2: Direct-Access Generic USB MS Reader 0.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2
scsi 5:0:0:3: Direct-Access Generic USB SM Reader 0.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 2
sd 5:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0
sd 5:0:0:1: Attached scsi generic sg3 type 0
sd 5:0:0:1: Attached scsi generic sg3 type 0
sd 5:0:0:2: Attached scsi generic sg4 type 0
sd 5:0:0:3: Attached scsi generic sg5 type 0
sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk
sd 5:0:0:1: [sdc] Attached SCSI removable disk
sd 5:0:0:2: [sdd] Attached SCSI removable disk
sd 5:0:0:3: [sde] Attached SCSI removable disk


This sounds ok to me (the card reader has several slots, so I think that's the reason for the many attached disks), but nevertheless, no item shows up in the device notifier.


Has someone experience something similar before?


Best,
Zsaja

Is it shown in the output of "lshal"?

lshal returns a lot of stuff, ending with

"Dumped 142 device(s) from the Global Device List"

If I disconnect the card reader, the final line is

"Dumped 136 device(s) from the Global Device List"

So it seems that the hubs in the card reader are listed by lshal. Shall I post the complete output (rather long), or is that not necessary?

That shouldn't be needed. Is the output from "solid-hardware list" around the same length?

solid-hardware list returns precisely as many lines as lshal lists devices.

This means that the bug is in the Device Notifier's handling of Predicates ( Device Actions ).

Can you please check the output of the following?

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cat $(ls $(kde4-config --localprefix)/apps/solid/actions/) | grep Predicate

You can use the command "solid-hardware query <predicate>" to check what devices it matches aganist.

I tried your suggested command, which wanted to list the directory .kde/apps/solid/actions/ in my home directory, but this subdirectory doesn't exist here. Also in ~/.kde/share/apps, there is no solid subdirectory. Using locate I figured out that there is the directory

/usr/share/kde4/apps/solid/actions,

is that the one you were asking for? On my computer, it contains

amarok-play-audiocd.desktop
digikam-opencamera.desktop
dolphin-open-audiocd.desktop
dragonplayer-opendvd.desktop
k3b_audiocd_rip.desktop
k3b_copy_disc.desktop
k3b_create_audio_cd_from_blank_medium.desktop
k3b_create_data_project_from_blank_medium.desktop
k9copy_assistant_open.desktop
k9copy_open.desktop
kaffeine_play_audiocd.desktop
kaffeine_play_dvd.desktop
kaffeine_play_videocd.desktop
test-predicate-openinwindow.desktop

So no "Predicate" here. Or was I supposed to replace Predicate with something related to the card reader?

Sorry, I'm not quite sure how to proceed here, and also not what I am supposed to enter in the solid-hardware query, could you please explain in some more detail?

Those are the correct files. They need to have their contents extracted ( using cat ) then checked for the string "Predicate", which will exclude the names, translations of names, comments, etc.

Try this instead:

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cat $(ls $(kde4-config --prefix)/kde4/apps/solid/actions/) | grep Predicate

Using cat * | grep Predicate in /usr/share/kde4/apps/solid/actions returns

X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Audio' ]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[ [ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND StorageVolume.usage == 'FileSystem' ] OR Camera.supportedDrivers == 'gphoto' ]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Audio' ]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[[ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Data|VideoDvd' ] OR [ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Data|VideoDvd' ]]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Audio']
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent & 'Audio|Data|VideoDvd' ]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[[StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.blank == true ] AND [OpticalDisc.discType == 'CdRecordable' OR OpticalDisc.discType == 'CdRewritable']]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.blank == true]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[[ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Data|VideoDvd' ] OR [ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Data|VideoDvd' ]]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[[ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Data|VideoDvd' ] OR [ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Data|VideoDvd' ]]
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=OpticalDisc.availableContent & 'Audio'
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=OpticalDisc.availableContent & 'VideoDvd'
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=OpticalDisc.availableContent & 'VideoCd|SuperVideoCd'
X-KDE-Solid-Predicate=[ [ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND [ StorageVolume.usage == 'FileSystem' OR StorageVolume.usage == 'Encrypted' ] ] OR [ IS StorageAccess AND StorageDrive.driveType == 'Floppy' ] ]

I hope that's the info you've been asking for?

Yes. Nothing seems wrong there. Try running, for each of those lines them through "solid-hardware query <predicate>" like so.

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solid-hardware query "[ StorageVolume.ignored == false AND OpticalDisc.availableContent == 'Audio' ]"

To see if your card reader is shown.

I worked my way through the list, but for each of the entered commands, there is no output at all.

This explains why nothing is shown by the Device Notifier. Why none of the actions are matched by the Device I do not know, and unless you recently updated your KDE packages, is not related to KDE ( and is the fault of the underlying subsystem, HAL )

Hm, that's not exactly the answer I was hoping for, but thanks anyway for all your help. Any idea what the (apparantly not KDE related) problem could be?

Unfortunately not, but it likely resides in HAL not exposing information about the device correctly.

When you performed the above, you did have a card inserted in the card reader right?

In the end, it turned out that my card reader was somehow broken. Replacing it with a new one, everything works fine now.