Network Manager: "New ad hoc network..." does nothing

[Prateek Karandikar]

Binary package hint: plasma-widget-networkmanagement

Steps to reproduce:

1. Click on the Plasma network management applet and click on "connect to other network".
2. Select "New Ad-hoc network..." in the menu that appears.
3. Click on the "Connect" button.
4. Watch as the window closes and nothing happens.

What should happen in the last step:

A dialog box to configure the new ad-hoc network being created appears.

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Sat Oct 31 18:04:49 2009
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
Package: plasma-widget-network-manager 0.9~svn1029786+ag1-0ubuntu1
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_IN
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-14.48-generic
SourcePackage: plasma-widget-networkmanagement
Uname: Linux 2.6.31-14-generic i686
XsessionErrors:
 (polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1:2028): GLib-CRITICAL **: g_once_init_leave: assertion `initialization_value != 0' failed
 (epiphany-browser:31654): Gtk-CRITICAL **: gtk_tree_view_scroll_to_cell: assertion `tree_view->priv->tree != NULL' failed
 (epiphany-browser:31654): Gtk-CRITICAL **: gtk_tree_view_scroll_to_cell: assertion `tree_view->priv->tree != NULL' failed
 (epiphany-browser:31654): Gtk-CRITICAL **: gtk_tree_view_scroll_to_cell: assertion `tree_view->priv->tree != NULL' failed

[Ryan Novosielski (novosirj)]

Try checking /var/log/daemon.log when attempting to connect to an Ad-Hoc network. I suspect you may see something like this:

Nov 18 08:57:20 novosirj-laptop NetworkManager: <WARN>
> >>>> wait_for_connection_expired(): Connection (2)
> >>>> /org/freedesktop/NetworkManagerSettings/2 failed to activate (timeout):
> >>>> (0) Connection was not provided by any settings service

If that is the case, this appears to be the bug we're both being affected by. I spoke to one of the Network Maanger maintainers and what he said was:

So this log indicates that the applet isn't creating the connection correctly and providing it to NetworkManager after you click the
network.

Can you confirm that you see the same log entries?

[Simon Jagoe (azriphale)]

I am running Jaunty.

I get absolutely nothing when trying to create an ad-hoc network, and only silence in /var/log/daemon.log

[Ryan Novosielski (novosirj)]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Simon Jagoe wrote:
> I am running Jaunty.
>
> I get absolutely nothing when trying to create an ad-hoc network, and
> only silence in /var/log/daemon.log

This is for Karmic. It is possible that Jaunty logs to a different log
(perhaps /var/log/NetworkManager.log?).

I'm really not sure that is relevant though -- does Jaunty even use the
same applet as Karmic? I think probably not.

- --
 ---- _ _ _ _ ___ _ _ _
 |Y#| | | |\/| | \ |\ | | |Ryan Novosielski - Systems Programmer II
 |$&| |__| | | |__/ | \| _| |<email address hidden> - 973/972.0922 (2-0922)
 \__/ Univ. of Med. and Dent.|IST/CST - NJMS Medical Science Bldg - C630
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[Ryan Novosielski (novosirj)]

It appears as if I may have gotten around this one by removing the "network-manager-kde" package and rebooting. Give that a shot! The reason I chose that package is that it seemed to bear a very close resemblance to the package mentioned in these links:

http://www.quitebrightlight.com/2009/01/opensuse-111-connection-was-not-provided-by-any-settings-service/
http://<email address hidden>/msg10610.html

It seems like the bug here is actually allowing that package to coexist on the system. It actually is not in any repository that I can find, and may be the result of having upgraded from Jaunty.

[Prateek Karandikar (prateek.karandikar)]

I've upgraded from Jaunty too. I don't have network-manager-kde installed, since "sudo aptitude remove network-manager-kde" says

No packages will be installed, upgraded, or removed.
0 packages upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 0B of archives. After unpacking 0B will be used.

I can't check now, since I seem to be affected by another bug: clicking (left- and right-) on the plasma applet says "Network Management disabled" - it makes sense to me to always include with such a message an "I don't care, enable it now!" button, but apparently that's not how things work. :-(

This also reflects a disturbing trend of GUI frontends simply swallowing and ignoring errors instead of reporting them.

[Prateek Karandikar (prateek.karandikar)]

Just checked - there's nothing in /var/log/daemon.log after trying to create a new ad-hoc network.

[Tomas Grahn (tomas-grahn)]

This is still true on Lucid.

[Henrik Kröger (henrik-kroeger)]

I have a similiar problem in debian testing and I think it's the same:
"plasma-widget-networkmanagement" does not apply the ad-hoc setting to the network settings.
You can open "Manage Connections…" and change the mode of the network in question to "ad-hoc".

[Ario (mail2ario-list)]

Same here.
Ubuntu 10.04. Fully Updated. Installed KDE 4.4 from default repositories in synaptic. Attempted to created new Ad Hoc network as described above but nothing happened. Since I need wireless I have no other choices to leave KDE and get back to Gnome until it solved or I have enough time to start participating in KDE development!
Please solve it men.