Strange LCD brightness up function implementation on the Acer Aspire 5720

[heni]

When I try increase LCD brightness, brightness is resetted to darkest from highest value.

 $cat /proc/acpi/video/OVGA/DD03/brightness
levels: 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
current: 90

  ... I press [Fn + <Right>]

 $cat /proc/acpi/video/OVGA/DD03/brightness
levels: 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
current: 100

  ... Also press [Fn + <Right>]

 $cat /proc/acpi/video/OVGA/DD03/brightness
levels: 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
current: 10

  ... And I must 9 times press [Fn + <Right>] to revert brightness to '100' :(
===============
=Technical information:=
===============
Description: Ubuntu jaunty (development branch)
Release: 9.04

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and help to improve Ubuntu.

This is not an issue with acpi-support, which is not involved with hotkey handling in current versions of Ubuntu. But to know where the bug lies, I need to know more about your setup. First, are you using Ubuntu or Kubuntu?

[heni (eugene-krokhalev)]

I'm using Ubuntu.

[Stefano Rivera (stefanor)]

I see the same behaviour on my MacBook 2.1 (and the bug has been present intrepid).

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/GMS, 943/940GML Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)

I assume the correct package for this would be gnome-power-manager

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

This assumes that the brightness is actually being handled the standard way, with hal and gnome-power-manager. I'm not sure this is the case; I can't reproduce such a "wrap-around" behavior on my hardware, so I suspect this is happening outside of hal's control.

Can you please step through the guide at <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Hotkeys/Troubleshooting>, to determine where these keypresses are or are not being sent?

[Stefano Rivera (stefanor)]

Hi Steve (2009.04.14_15:33:33_+0200)
> This assumes that the brightness is actually being handled the standard
> way, with hal and gnome-power-manager. I'm not sure this is the case; I
> can't reproduce such a "wrap-around" behavior on my hardware, so I
> suspect this is happening outside of hal's control.

Yes, that it is going through gnome-power manager. Example debugging output:

 - Event0 0x1f20b70
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-button.c FN:gpm_button_filter_x_events,149
 - Key 233 mapped to key brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-button.c FN:gpm_button_emit_type,96
 - emitting button-pressed : brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-manager.c FN:button_pressed_cb,1029
 - Button press event type=brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-srv-screensaver.c FN:button_pressed_cb,167
 - Button press event type=brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-backlight.c FN:gpm_backlight_button_pressed_cb,534
 - Button press event type=brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_screen,407
 - using resource 0x1f283d0
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 1 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 2 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_output_up,280
 - hard value=296, min=0, max=296
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_output_up,282
 - already max
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 3 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 4 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_screen,407
 - using resource 0x1f283d0
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 1 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 2 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_output_get_percentage,223
 - hard value=296, min=0, max=296
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_output_get_percentage,225
 - percentage 100
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 3 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_foreach_resource,368
 - resource 4 of 4
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-feedback-widget.c FN:gpm_feedback_display_value,169
 - Displaying 1.000000 on feedback widget
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-info.c FN:button_pressed_cb,679
 - Button press event type=brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-button.c FN:hal_device_condition_cb,413
 - condition=ButtonPressed, details=brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-button.c FN:gpm_button_emit_type,92
 - ignoring duplicate button brightness-up
TI:17:03:03 TH:0x1cbfa00 FI:gpm-brightness-xrandr.c FN:gpm_brightness_xrandr_filt...

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

Stefano,

Please post the output of 'lshal' on this system.

[Stefano Rivera (stefanor)]

Attached lshal output on Macbook 2.1

[heni (eugene-krokhalev)]

Attached lshal output for my Acer Aspire 5720.

Also I have noticed that all is good if I kill gnome-power-manager.

[heni (eugene-krokhalev)]

debug output of gnome-power-manager (gnome-power-manager --no-daemon --verbose)

[Kelvin Gardiner (kelvingardiner)]

I get the same issue on macbook 3.1, lshal output is attached.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

Here is the relevant hal output for the macbooks:

udi = '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/macbook_backlight'
  info.addons = {'hald-addon-macbook-backlight'} (string list)
  info.capabilities = {'laptop_panel'} (string list)
  info.category = 'laptop_panel' (string)
  info.interfaces = {'org.freedesktop.Hal.Device.LaptopPanel'} (string list)
  info.parent = '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/computer' (string)
  info.product = 'MacBook Backlight Control' (string)
  info.subsystem = 'unknown' (string)
  info.udi = '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/macbook_backlight' (string)
  laptop_panel.access_method = 'custom' (string)
  laptop_panel.num_levels = 118 (0x76) (int)

So this is probably a bug in hald-addon-macbook-backlight. But the original bug reporter is not using a macbook. If you're having this issue with a macbook, please open a new bug report with 'ubuntu-bug hal' and describe what you're seeing.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

heni,

when you say "alll is good if I kill gnome-power-manager", do you mean that the brightness level is changed when pressing the button, even without gnome-power-manager running? If so, that's quite unusual as well.

[heni (eugene-krokhalev)]

Yes, brightness level is changed normally without gnome-power-manager.
It looks like some app (except gnome-power-manager) try to hook and process LCD brightness change event.

[heni (eugene-krokhalev)]

This information may be usefull

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

The only program I see in your process list that I can imagine /could/ do something with this event would be gkrellm.

Could you check whether the brightness still changes if you stop both gnome-power-manager and gkrellm? If so, can you check whether the brightness changes when you stop both gnome-power-manager and hal?

[heni (eugene-krokhalev)]

Brightness level is changed normally when I stop gkrellm, gnome-power-manager and hal together.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

heni,

Please try installing the attached fdi file to /etc/hal/fdi/policy/, restart hal with 'sudo service hal restart', and tell me whether this fixes the problem for you.

[heni (eugene-krokhalev)]

The behaviour of my system (on brightness change) has not changed after using your 10-acer-backlight.fdi

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

heni,

Can you post the output of lshal again, with this fdi file installed? I'd like to double-check that my instructions to you had the intended effect.

[mrrusof (ruslanledesmagarza)]

Hi,

I have the same problem as heni, the same laptop model, tried the steps so far and I got the same result. Here is my lshal output.

[Scott Howard (showard314)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. The issue that you reported is one that should be reproducible with the live environment of the Desktop CD of the development release - Karmic Koala. It would help us greatly if you could test with it so we can work on getting it fixed in the next release of Ubuntu. You can find out more about the development release at http://www.ubuntu.com/testing/. Thanks again and we appreciate your help.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

there is no information missing here. setting back to confirmed.

[mrrusof (ruslanledesmagarza)]

I installed Karmic Koala and now I can control the brightness, but every time I press Fn + left or right to dim or increase the brightness, the screen brightness changes two times instead of one. Both jumps occur one after the other very fast but I can still distinguish them.

[mrrusof (ruslanledesmagarza)]

I've gone back to 9.04 64 bits, I wonder if anyone could point me in the right direction to make this work with or without g-p-m (as intended in http://people.freedesktop.org/~hughsient/quirk/quirk-backlight-index.html)

Thanks.