Ubuntu Wiki

• Launchpad Entry: desktop-lucid-jockey-hotplug-support

Summary

Jockey supports printers, Wifi cards, and DVB-T cards, which often come with USB and are hotplugged. Instead of just triggering Jockey to check for drivers once after installation, we bring up Jockey when such a device is plugged in and needs firmware.

Release Note

The check for required hardware drivers ("Jockey") is now run when hotplugging hardware which needs firmware, such as DVB-T or Broadcom WLAN USB sticks.

Design

• When a device is plugged in which needs firmware, the kernel triggers a "firmware" subsystem uevent.

• Add code to update-notifier to watch for those uevents, check if the requested firmware file is missing, and if so, launch jockey-gtk (or jockey-kde in update-notifier-kde).

• Check modules which have jockey handlers (b43, wl, dvb-*) for having correct firmware file links in modinfo. E. g. b43 has a wrong one, which needs to be fixed in the kernel.

Implementation

See blueprint work items.

Test/Demo Plan

1. Ensure that you do not have firmware installed yet: no /lib/firmware/b43/, and the linux-firmware-nonfree package is not installed.

2. Log into a GNOME or netbook session.
3. Plug in an USB device which needs firmware, such as a DVB-T stick or a hotpluggable Broadcom Wifi device.
4. After some seconds, Jockey should pop up, offering the firmware package/download.
5. Regardless of whether you installed it or not, if you remove the device and plug it back in, Jockey should not pop up again.

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