Cannot mount USB serial device. Not even as root.

durque · July 19, 2010, 1:29pm

Greetings!

I want to mount a serial device. To get do the data section in the device and retrieve image files. Not even root can mount.


# ls -l /dev/ttyU*
crw-rw---- 1 root uucp 188, 0 Jul 20 13:07 /dev/ttyUSB0
# mount -t fuse /dev/ttyUSB0 /media/M65
/bin/sh: /dev/ttyUSB0: Permission denied

From /var/log/mesages


Jul 20 13:26:38 snofnugg kernel: usb 2-2: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 5
Jul 20 13:26:38 snofnugg kernel: usb 2-2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
Jul 20 13:26:38 snofnugg kernel: pl2303 2-2:1.0: pl2303 converter detected
Jul 20 13:26:38 snofnugg kernel: usb 2-2: pl2303 converter now attached to ttyUSB0
Jul 20 13:26:38 snofnugg kernel: usb 2-2: New USB device found, idVendor=067b, idProduct=2303
Jul 20 13:26:38 snofnugg kernel: usb 2-2: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=0, SerialNumber=0

No entry in /etc/fstab. Should not been needed???

Here are my loaded drivers.


# lsmod | sort
Module                  Size  Used by
ac                      4480  0 
acpi_cpufreq            6864  0 
af_packet              16424  4 
agpgart                32308  3 drm,intel_agp
ata_generic             4484  0 
ata_piix               16640  3 
atl1e                  34348  0 
battery                11176  0 
binfmt_misc             7740  1 
button                  6568  0 
compat_ioctl32          1104  1 uvcvideo
cpufreq_conservative     6476  0 
cpufreq_powersave       1640  0 
cpufreq_userspace       3112  0 
crc_t10dif              1704  1 sd_mod
dm_mod                 62608  0 
dock                   11844  1 libata
drm                    74852  3 i915
edd                     8620  0 
eeepc_laptop            8300  0 
ehci_hcd               48564  0 
ext2                   60520  3 
fan                     4720  0 
fat                    45800  1 vfat
ff_memless              7132  1 usbhid
fuse                   50628  1 
hid                    35568  1 usbhid
hwmon                   2916  2 eeepc_laptop,thermal_sys
i2c_core               29892  1 i2c_i801
i2c_i801               10508  0 
i915                   28232  2 
iTCO_vendor_support     3368  1 iTCO_wdt
iTCO_wdt               10016  0 
ide_core               97492  1 ide_pci_generic
ide_pci_generic         3428  0 
intel_agp              25072  1 
ip6_tables             12596  4 ip6t_LOG,ip6table_raw,ip6table_mangle,ip6table_filter
ip6t_LOG                6212  7 
ip6t_REJECT             4984  3 
ip6table_filter         2408  1 
ip6table_mangle         2288  0 
ip6table_raw            1792  1 
ip_tables              11364  2 iptable_raw,iptable_filter
ipt_LOG                 5708  8 
ipt_REJECT              2760  3 
iptable_filter          2548  1 
iptable_raw             2056  1 
ipv6                  242032  27 ip6t_REJECT,nf_conntrack_ipv6,ip6table_mangle
libata                161348  2 ata_generic,ata_piix
loop                   14064  0 
mbcache                 7592  1 ext2
nf_conntrack           67112  5 nf_conntrack_ipv6,xt_NOTRACK,xt_state,nf_conntrack_netbios_ns,nf_conntrack_ipv4
nf_conntrack_ipv4      10480  4 
nf_conntrack_ipv6      20124  4 
nf_conntrack_netbios_ns     2152  0 
nls_cp437               5432  0 
nls_iso8859_1           3768  0 
output                  2736  1 video
pcspkr                  2344  0 
pl2303                 16232  0 
processor              43868  4 acpi_cpufreq,thermal
rt2860sta             481008  1 
rtc_cmos               10896  0 
rtc_core               17384  1 rtc_cmos
rtc_lib                 2816  1 rtc_core
scsi_mod              149928  4 usb_storage,sg,sd_mod,libata
sd_mod                 31588  5 
sg                     29408  0 
snd                    56800  15 snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_seq,snd_seq_device,snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm,snd_timer,snd_hwdep
snd_hda_intel         431460  4 
snd_hwdep               7160  1 snd_hda_intel
snd_mixer_oss          14288  1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_page_alloc          8184  2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm
snd_pcm                76988  3 snd_pcm_oss,snd_hda_intel
snd_pcm_oss            43132  0 
snd_seq                51920  0 
snd_seq_device          7168  1 snd_seq
snd_timer              20204  2 snd_seq,snd_pcm
soundcore               6660  1 snd
speedstep_lib           3884  0 
thermal                19976  0 
thermal_sys            11376  4 video,fan,thermal,processor
uhci_hcd               23372  0 
usb_storage            90436  0 
usbcore               165900  8 usb_storage,pl2303,usbserial,uvcvideo,usbhid,uhci_hcd,ehci_hcd
usbhid                 45628  0 
usbserial              29340  1 pl2303
uvcvideo               51036  0 
v4l1_compat            13096  2 uvcvideo,videodev
vfat                    9656  0 
video                  20312  0 
videodev               31236  1 uvcvideo
x_tables               14500  11 ip6t_LOG,xt_tcpudp,xt_pkttype,ipt_LOG,xt_limit,ip6t_REJECT,xt_NOTRACK,ipt_REJECT,xt_state,ip_tables,ip6_tables
xt_NOTRACK              1544  4 
xt_limit                2056  15 
xt_pkttype              1560  3 
xt_state                1904  8 
xt_tcpudp               2728  2

How can I mount the device?

[OpenSuSE 11.1 | 2.6.27.45-0.1-pae #1 SMP | i686]

johest · July 19, 2010, 2:04pm

Hi there,

just to ask…

isnt an converter something like an isdn modem or an serial line in?
As far as i know you cant mount this tty things you could connect via minicom or any other software which works on this serial line.
But it isnt a device its only a conenction, ever tried to mount your internet connection?

But thats only what i think

Greetz Joerg

hcvv · July 19, 2010, 3:55pm

Correct johest.

To begin with saying “Cannot mount USB serial device. Not even as root.” shows that you have some knowledge missing. ONLY root can mount.

Further look at this:

crw-rw---- 1 root uucp 188, 0 Jul 20 13:07 /dev/ttyUSB0

The c at the begin of the line shows this is a “character” device.
For mounting you need a “block” device to begin with. And then there must be of course a file system on the block device that is understood by the kernel.
None of the above will ever be true for a tty (emulating) device.

What is on the other end of the cable that makes you think you can mount this somewher in your directory tree?

durque · July 19, 2010, 9:38pm

Thanks for the comments. Let me elaborate the situation.
The data I’m trying to access is stored in memory of the “device” which is a mobile phones’ memory.

Joerg (johest): You can use the “mount”-command on a communication device when attached by e.g. a data cable (Ref: SieFS project home page). The mount command I used was successful yesterday. It does indeed provide a communications link to the device (e.i. the cell phone). I don’t know why the same command fails today (Permissions. hmmmmm…???)

Henk van Velden (hcvv): Unfortunately I didn’t notice whether the ttyUSB0-device file was a character device or a block device. It just worked. I plugged the IP40 data cable (Ref. the listing from /var/log/messages) and typed the mount command (ref. first posting). Although I could not see the device mounted using e.g. df-command, I could “cd” down the directory /media/M65/… But that was yesterday.

Now I’ve ran out out options to fix myself.
Any suggestions to fix permissions for ttyUSB0?

hcvv · July 19, 2010, 10:08pm

Does* /media/M65* exist? (stupid question, but one never knows).

durque · July 20, 2010, 12:12am

Absolutely!
To be sure there is no trouble there, I’ve made it wide open (not very cautious i may add).


$ ls -l /media
total 0
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 0 1970-01-01 01:00 M65

hcvv · July 20, 2010, 10:11am

Looks allright. But the date is a bit strange there, looks like the epoch. Your system can not be that old, let alone that directory.

I tried to read a bit about fuse. Didn’t know much about it (still not ). It could be possible that mounting of a character special file is possible there. This is from the man mount:

Most devices are indicated by a file name (of a block special device), like /dev/sda1, but there are other possibilities. For example, in the case of an NFS mount, device may look like knuth.cwi.nl:/dir. It is possible to indicate a block special device using its volume LABEL or UUID (see the -L and -U options below).
(the fat is from me).

Most strange is that you say it worked earlier. Of course you should vehemently try to find out what you changed between the two occasions, no matter if you thinki it is related to the case or not.

durque · July 20, 2010, 11:37am

Looks allright. But the date is a bit strange there, looks like the epoch. Your system can not be that old, let alone that directory.

You’re absolutely right. I checked again and got this new result. Looks way more sound.


$ ls -l /media
total 4
drwxrwxr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-07-19 12:13 M65

Alas no difference.

deano_ferrari · July 20, 2010, 12:31pm

@durque

The SieFS link you provided uses this command string to mount

mount -t siefs /dev/ttyS0 /media/M65

I don’t know anything about your serial device in question. Its been a while since I first played with fuse (to mount ntfs partitions). Could that be the problem?

Have you tried deleting and recreating the mount point? Just a guess here.

DenverD · July 21, 2010, 3:50pm

i wonder why HAL doesn’t automatically detect the phone as a memory
device…and launch a popup asking @durque what s/he wants to do…

and, i wonder if that is not happening because @durque’s 11.1 is two
years older than the phone, so two ideas:

download a live openSUSE 11.3, boot from it and then connect your
phone and see if it is automatically connected as a memory storage
location…or
might do a google search to see if other have encountered and
solved this same problem…like (for example):

http://www.google.com/linux?q=“Nokia+1208”

–
Enjoy Packman’s benefits? Show your appreciation by donating at
http://se.unixheads.org/?donate

DenverD
CAVEAT: http://is.gd/bpoMD [posted via NNTP w/openSUSE 10.3]

pjessen · July 21, 2010, 4:44pm

DenverD wrote:

> i wonder why HAL doesn’t automatically detect the phone as a memory
> device…and launch a popup asking @durque what s/he wants to do…

It sounds like the phone does not present itself as a memory device, but
as a serial device. That probably means the memory is accessible via
some intricate serial protocol (maybe even xmodem or some such).

–
Per Jessen, Zürich (31.1°C)
http://en.opensuse.org/User:Pjessen

durque · July 28, 2010, 6:31pm

First let me apologize for the delay. I’ve been away a couple of days. Secondly thanks for the comments.

deano_ferrari:

“Have you tried deleting and recreating the mount point? Just a guess here.”

Sorry, no effect.

DenverD:
Good observation. I haven’t considered the descrepancy between the the phone and the OS. I was hoping the recent versions of fuse would take care of that. May too hasty?

You comment that HAL should pick up the devvice There’s ara some info in the /var/log/messages, when the device is attached. What kind og steps should I take to get it

Excellent suggestion. I’ve downloaded the full DVD of 11.3 and the LiveCD. I’ll give it a spin. But cold install is a bit drastic, don’t you think?
Thanks for the hint. Actually, Wammu/Gammu do talk to the phone, but not with the data storage part. ???

Do I need to compile and install the SieFS filesystem anyways? Or is there an RPM available that y’all know about?