Bug#384379: [Pkg-bluetooth-maintainers] Bug#384379: WORK-AROUND for "iscan not set"

[Hendrik Sattler]

Am Sonntag 31 Dezember 2006 13:36 schrieb Marcel Holtmann:
> > Note that deleting the "config" file in /var/lib/bluetooth is an
> > essential part of the solution.
>
> this is a big _NO_. Don't mess with the configuration storage directly.
> The configuration storage has priority over the hcid.conf file and this
> is meant to be this way.

And that's not written down anywhere in the user documentation.

> The "iscan" and "pscan" config option are some legacy option that are
> still available for some strange corner cases for some embedded distros
> and they are not meant for general and permanent configuration.

So what's the proposal? Configuration files have to be in /etc and not 
in /var/lib!
The administrator should be able to change the default (visibility or not) or 
there should be an always working default.
That is currently not the case because the bluetooth guys change stuff but the 
user frontends do catch up a bit late. Just remember the passkey situation 
and this is pretty much the same. It probably gets solved in the long run but 
that's a strange idea of development :-/

> If people don't learn that hcid.conf are proposed default values for the
> cold run only, then I might simply remove the whole file in the next
> upstream release. So stop writing ugly distribution specific hacks and
> better ask upstream for it. There might might a real bug hiding
> somewhere.

If package maintainers and upstream authors don't learn to document such 
thing, the user will not learn. /etc/bluetooth/hcid.conf is a configuration 
file and I expect that changes are respected. It is written _NOWHERE_ that 
this only defines an initial state.
Reading hcid.conf manpage tells me nothing about that.

> First of all this is an ugly hack and has no right to exist. Second the
> configuration storage is meant to be permanent.

An ugly hack for an ugly situation.

I give you my point of view:
_I_ wanted to fix discoverability of my system without some strange DBUS 
commands that are documented nowhere but in the code.
Yes, by now I know that hcid/dbus-api.txt exists but only in the source 
package because it is not in the binary package.
Beside that, running the dbus command suggested in this bug report works, too.
It should be noted, though, that you have to be root.
It probably is the better alternative with exceptions:
* you cannot change the mode of devices that are currently not plugged in
* you can only refer to devices by using the device name, not the address

So is there an easy command line tool for all those dbus options (except using 
raw dbus command)?: no == very bad usibility (and an awful lot to type for 
one option)

So how can you solve this problem with your input:
* ship the dbus API documenation in the binary packages
* give the user and root a shell tool to make use of the things in the bluez 
dbus API without getting bloody hands by using dbus-send
* document in the manpages what you wrote here

HS