Bluetooth almost impossible to pair - too short timeout, pin sel fails

[tz]

Binary package hint: gnome-bluetooth

I just tried to pair a fairly standard phone under Karmic.

First, it seems to randomly ignore the PIN selection dialog. I keep setting it to a short but custom PIN and instead it pops up a very long random pin. That would not be so bad, except I can't possibly type in the PIN within the very short time before Karmic says it timed out and failed.

So something is wrong in the logic for selecting the PIN - it ignores the setting for the one I type and uses the default random long PIN and I've tried several times. Sometimes it doesn't ignore it (but didn't show the pin so something else might hae gone wrong).

Second, the pairing timeout under Karmic is on the order of a few seconds, so you have to shift to the other device and type 50 WPM without any errors to possibly enter the PIN in time. Even the simple pin would be a problem.

[David Given (david.given)]

Me too, both parts. It appears to completely ignore the custom PIN, and then times out while I'm still halfway through typing in the long autogenerated PIN into my phone.

[Martin Ling (martin-launchpad)]

Even worse - I get the same thing trying to pair a bluetooth GPS. Even having specifically selected '0000' in the PIN options, it generates a six digit PIN and gives me about half a second to type this into the GPS (er - how?) before failing.

[Julian Cerruti (jcerruti)]

Same here, trying to pair an HTC Magic to a Lenovo Thinkpad T400 with a fresh Karmic install.
Is there any known workaround to this?

[KeithG (grider-4)]

No problem pairing a phone that can negotiate a random code, but my BT serial with a code 1234, I cannot pair. It shows, but after I select the 1234 code, it tries to send a random code.

Please help.

KeithG

[Anders Olsson (anders-anderso)]

Same problem here, regardless of what I select I see 6 random digits flashing by and then the message telling me that pairing has failed. This is in Karmic (MacBook Pro) and Lucid (Acer 1810TZ). Blueman and bluez-gnome can pair just fine (tested in Karmic). Try

$ sudo apt-get install blueman
$ blueman-applet

and click on the bluetooth icon and go from there. My unit is a Holux GPSlim 236 bluetooth gps, I haven't actually managed to use the gps yet though.

[Anders Olsson (anders-anderso)]

This bug has some similarities to #241000.

[David Given (david.given)]

This is still extant on Maverick --- the PIN options are ignored completely and it always prompts you with a very long autogenerated PIN.

Is anyone actually reading these? I notice this bug is still unassigned despite being two releases old...

[Jasper van der Neut - Stulen (neutstulen)]

If you first select the PIN option and then select the device to pair with, the custom PIN options won't be ignored.

[DSutton (dsutton)]

This bug still exists for me in a fresh install of Maverick, and it was in Jaunty also. Sometimes the program will use a custom PIN and sometimes it will not, possibly due to the order I clicked things, as per #8. I previously used Blueman for pairing until my Bluetooth DUN stopped working with Blueman. Blueman may be a workaround for pairing some of your devices. From what I've seen, devices paired in either one will show up in the other, but the pairing may be missing functionality.

Re #6: I have not run the tests from #241000 (http://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/bluez/+bug/241000), but since that bug is marked as closed, i would agree that this is similar but not a duplicate, and thus needs its own attention.

This has been open for over a year, are there any developers looking at this yet? This seems like an important issue for Bluetooth usability. I'm a programmer and I would be willing to poke around, but I have never worked on an Ubuntu package before and I don't know where to start.

[balak (balak)]

Another me too comment. Pairing is just too short for me to even type the stuff on my android phone. Is there a configuration to increase the timeout delay?

[Mg-degroot (mg-degroot)]

And another me too :) Tried to pair with an Android phone. It gives me a passcode and a few seconds to enter it, way to short to even go for 0000. Perhaps I'm using a wrong method?

[Dave Ahlswede (mightyquinn)]

Fresh install of Maverick on here, with the exact same problem. (Samsung Exclaim, non-android phone)