No matter what I try, I cannot get kbluetooth to work.
The BT icon appears greyed out in the toolbar. If I select it, a Konqueror screen appears with the error message “The process for the bluetooth protocol died unexpectedly.”
I can communicate with BT devices OK using the command line tools (hcitool, etc).
I have found numerous old references to this problem from when 11.1 was first released, but no solutions. I cannot believe that this is still “broken”.
I would be EXTREMELY grateful for any help to fix this, as it has become an urgent problem.
It depends on what you want to do with the BT. It is still broken in 3.5 and it will STAY broken, since it was decided to maintain only version 4.1 and after, due mainly to lack of human resources to maintain both lines. I have bluetooth working on my system KDE 3.5 Opensuse 11.1 (for BT mouse, and the OBEX SERVER). Pairing does work too. Now I achieved this through the installation of the KDE4 bluetooth (parallel to the 3.5 bluetooth) searching for it in the start menue (kde4 bluetooth). This allows me to use a MS bt-mouse correctly, to recognize my phone (did not sync however) and transfer files via OBEX on my Sony Ericsson K550i.
If you need so badly BT working, maybe you should consider to go regress to 11.0 or to advance to 11.2 with KDE 4.4. There Bluetooth should be working.
Kdebluetooth works in 11.2, as good as it ever has. I have never been able to get it to connect to much. I always use blueman. You cab try the one click install here Software.openSUSE.org
…It is still broken in 3.5 and it will STAY broken, since it was decided to maintain only version 4.1 and after…
I find this incredible. Bluetooth used to work on earlier releases, and KDE3.5 is an official option in 11.1. IMHO, this casual approach to support for a fundamental technology is totally unacceptable. The reason I still use 11.1/KDE3.5 is that I still do not believe that KDE4 is stable enough and, as far as I’m aware, OpenSUSE are still supporting 11.1, which, IMHO, should include all standard supplied desktop environments.
Well, in all honesty it is not a “casual approach”. What happened is (especially with this bluetooth issue) that some of the libraries thought to be compatible with KDE3 weren’t actually compatible. This (in opensuse) created a conflict between the two installation options, since the developers wanted to deliver the choice rightly to people like you in order to stay with 11.1 and to use still KDE3.5. In all honesty, I think one can really well work now with 11.1 and KDE3.5 and if one is choosing 11.2, it is now (with the latest KDE) quite stable enough to work and to substitute the aging 3.5. Sure if you want to continue to use 11.0 up to December, nobody does tell you not to update. Well you are running out of security updates, so what…I am not seeing for 6 month such an issue. If it is, change to 11.1 with bluetooth 4 installed.
OpenSUSE are still supporting 11.1, which, IMHO, should include all standard supplied desktop environments.
Correct but I think the bluetooth error is a “wontfix”. The time needed to fix it would be higher then the value to the (now few) user.
As the last reply stated you will have to abandon 11.1 on December 31st (see the hyperlink below) SUSE Linux Lifetime - openSUSE
I have already moved to 11.2 partly instigated by bluetooth not working in 11.1.
Numerous first attempts at installing 11.2 went well until it got to the first reboot. Then it all went wrong.
I would take too long to explain my problems in detail here but I will try to sum them up before long.
Initially, installation problems seemed so unfathomable that I evaluated several other distros. After a lot of failed installations I had learned from successful installations of Gnome based distributions Fedora 12 and Ubuntu 9.1 (a) Gnome bluetooth worked well (b) Despite the various distros sharing the same linux kernel (Linux 2.6.31) their installers handled ACPI and non ACPI BIOSes very differently and were capable of screwing up the installation.
So I re-evaluated openSUSE 11.2 installation and found that I could install the Gnome or KDE4 desktops successfully on any of my machines without any problems if I used the acpi=off option (but this undesirably sacrificed Cool’n’Quiet processor control) or preferably if I just cleared the “use Automatic Configuration” option box on the “Installation Mode” screen during the installation! It appears that automatic configuration uniquely assumes that your PC has an ACPI BIOS so if it hasn’t, when the PC first re-boots the installation looks for information in RAM and can’t find it. Other reasons for avoiding automatic configuration is that by updating during the installation you avoid having to solving the broken updater problem later on and as a bonus, the full set of Truetype fonts (with the exception of the Japanese set) usually download automatically without any problem (at least in the UK).
Now I will refocus on the central bluetooth subject.
If it is any help, the Broadcom chips in the StarTech.com usb dongles (e.g. USBBT2EDR - Class 2 ~ £8.99/ USBBT1EDR - Class 1 ~ £13.99) or the Broadcom chip in the now hard to find (at least in the UK) D-Link DBT-122 usb dongle work fine with 11.2.
I don’t have any experience with bluetooth input devices such as mice or keyboards but I do have a fair amount of experience with mobile phones as bluetooth devices.
On the subject of software, Gnome bluetooth is fully functional and allows easy PC controlled two way file transfers and phone browsing. Unfortunately, although Kbluetooth4 provides some working functions but it will not allow you to do PC controlled phone to PC transfers or browsing of what is on your phone. There is a way round the file transfer problem but I don’t like it. If you make your PC discoverable then by using your mobile phone as the initiating device you can pair your phone and PC and send files from your phone to your /home/user directory (I haven’t found any way of changing the destination). Once paired you can turn off your PC’s visibility but I would prefer to not turn it on in the first place.
Because of the Kbluetooth restrictions and earlier post here I tried installing all of the available versions of Blueman in KDE4 but I did not like the look of the dependency conflicts so I decided not to risk unwanted effects on other packages.
The bottom line is that I currently have both the Gnome and KDE4 desktop versions of openSUSE 11.2 in constant use because they both have individual strengths and weaknesses. That way I get round any individual desktop specific problem and keep an eye on their development until there a sufficiently clear winner. Yes I agree with your comment that KDE4 is not as stable as 3.5 but it is really not that bad. However even though I have tried several other Linux distros for a significant period I still prefer openSUSE.
Sorry I forgot to mention an unexptected Kbluetooth4 quirk.
By default KDE4 start-up does not activate the Bluetooth Manager application so nothing pops up automatically on the taskbar when you plug in a bluetooth usb dongle. You will have to either start the application manually from the launcher via Applications -> Internet -> Data Exchange -> (Bluetooth Framework) Bluetooth Manager or perhaps add the application to Autostart. After that you will be able to access the Bluetooth Manager menu from the taskbar.