plasma_applet_battery widget doesn't show Remaining Time when on battery

[LordKhain]

Binary package hint: plasma-widgets-workspace

Kubuntu Karmic Alpha 2 - plasma-widgets-workspace_4:4.2.95-0ubuntu2 and plasma-dataengines-workspace_4:4.2.95-0ubuntu4

Plasma applet battery widget doesn't show remaining time when on battery; it shows: discharging.

With plasma-widgets-workspace_4:4.2.90-0ubuntu2 and plasma-dataengines-workspace_4:4.2.90-0ubuntu4 it was working fine.

Regards,
  LordKhain

[LordKhain (lordkhain)]

Also Auto Notifications seems not to work properly with 4.2.95: every time I log in I get a notification from a "Daemon"; the two possible alternatives are "Ignore" "Switch to Daemon", but none produces any result at all, and the notification applet shows 1 unread note all the time.

Again, with 4.2.90 it seems to be working fine.

Regards,
  LordKhain

[LordKhain (lordkhain)]

I installed 5 updates:

python-packagekit_0.4.8-0ubuntu3
packagekit-backend-apt_0.4.8-0ubuntu3
packagekit_0.4.8-0ubuntu3
libpackagekit-qt11_0.4.8-0ubuntu3
libpackagekit-glib11_0.4.8-0ubuntu3

and the notifications seem to be working fine again; anyway the issue with the battery widget still remains.

Regards
  LordKhain

[Michael Marley (mamarley)]

I have the same issue on my Dell Vostro 1500, and it continues to occur on RC2. Confirming.

[Khairul Aizat Kamarudzzaman (fenris)]

me too, still dont have time remaining at battery widget in kde 4.3 rc2

[Jonathan Thomas (echidnaman)]

This was an intentional upstream decision, (http://websvn.kde.org/?view=rev&revision=978090) so it'd probably be best to take it up with KDE.

[Michael Marley (mamarley)]

Perhaps you mean http://websvn.kde.org/?view=rev&revision=978089

[Michael Marley (mamarley)]

I am trying to use the workaround he specified in the commit, but it is not working. I do not know which config file to use.

[Michael Marley (mamarley)]

OK, I have found it. In order to re-enable the feature that was removed, you need to edit the ~/.kde/share/config/plasma-desktop-appletsrc file. In the file, you will find what looks about like this:

[Containments][3][Applets][11]
geometry=1529,1,28,27
immutability=1
plugin=battery
zvalue=0

[Containments][3][Applets][11][Configuration][ExtenderItems][3]
extenderIconName=battery
extenderItemName=powermanagement
extenderItemPosition=0
extenderTitle=Power Management
isCollapsed=false
sourceAppletId=11
sourceAppletPluginName=battery

Between the two sections, if it does not already exist, add this:

[Containments][3][Applets][11][Configuration]
showRemainingTime=true

If the [Containments][3][Applets][11][Configuration] section does exist, then just add showRemainingTime=true to it.

[Khairul Aizat Kamarudzzaman (fenris)]

thanks michael,

the tricks work for me :)

[FriedChicken (domlyons)]

Could this option be patched into UI again? On my laptops the remaining time was quite useful and precise enough.

[Kde-2011-08 (kde-2011-08)]

Version: (using KDE 4.3.0)
Installed from: Ubuntu Packages

In KDE 3 the battery monitor tool had a very accurate Estimate Time Remaining feature. Please add this to the Battery Monitor plasmoid in KDE 4. Thanks.

[marco (marcomelo)]

Great Idea, knowing the "Estimate time" is clearly more useful than knowing a %

Hope it's donde for 4.3.1

Regards.

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

This feature was available in KDE 4.2, but disappeared in 4.3, so I'd consider this a bug rather than a wishlist item.

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

Just noticed that this is most likely the result of the following change, so the feature's disappearance is intentional:

http://websvn.kde.org/trunk/KDE/kdebase/workspace/plasma/applets/battery/battery.cpp?revision=978089&view=markup

[Kde-2011-08 (kde-2011-08)]

> This feature was available in KDE 4.2, but disappeared in 4.3, so
> I'd consider this a bug rather than a wishlist item.

In KDE, features missing from KDE 4 that were present in KDE 3 are wishlist, not bugs. Thre has been much discussion on this, and if you want convincing or feel the need to dispute it, please google the previous arguments on the subject.

> Just noticed that this is most likely the result of the following
> change, so the feature's disappearance is intentional:

I don't know if it is an intentional feature removal (unlikely) or a workaround (likely).

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

(In reply to comment #4)
> > This feature was available in KDE 4.2, but disappeared in 4.3, so
> > I'd consider this a bug rather than a wishlist item.
>
> In KDE, features missing from KDE 4 that were present in KDE 3 are wishlist,
> not bugs. Thre has been much discussion on this, and if you want convincing or
> feel the need to dispute it, please google the previous arguments on the
> subject.

That's why I wrote KDE 4.2. ;-) Anyway the SVN log I referenced above documents how to re-enable the feature, so for me the issue is solved.

[Kde-2011-08 (kde-2011-08)]

> That's why I wrote KDE 4.2.

Oops!

> Anyway the SVN log I referenced above documents
> how to re-enable the feature, so for me the issue is solved.

For coders. For us users there is no solution.

[marco (marcomelo)]

Check-box botton for enabling this?

[Kde-2011-08 (kde-2011-08)]

> Check-box botton for enabling this?

Please!

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

I wish that, too. an estimation algorithm can be relative precise if done right. I also don't see why the user whould be confused when the time estimated is wrong, because the tool tip clearly states "_estimated_ time left..".

[Simply-bugz (simply-bugz)]

I have been looking for this since I changed to kde and now i'm kde4.4 and still no sign of time estimation.

and I already expressed my frustration on the other thread.

<a href="https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=182940#c23"> https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=182940#c23>

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

You can edit a config file to re-enable this feature:

edit the file "~/.kde[4]/share/config/plasma-desktop-appletsrc"

search for the string "plugin=battery"

for me it is in the section
"[Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126]"

the go to the corresponding configuration section, for me
[Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126][Configuration]

and add the line:
showRemainingTime=true

then do "pkill plasma-desktop" and "plasma-desktop" from konsole/krunner

the time estimation for me really seems worse than the one from ms-windows, so perhaps it is possible to improve the backends.

[Sigra (sigra)]

(In reply to comment #11)
> You can edit a config file to re-enable this feature:
>
> edit the file "~/.kde[4]/share/config/plasma-desktop-appletsrc"
>
> search for the string "plugin=battery"
>
> for me it is in the section
> "[Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126]"
>
> the go to the corresponding configuration section, for me
> [Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126][Configuration]
>
> and add the line:
> showRemainingTime=true
>
> then do "pkill plasma-desktop" and "plasma-desktop" from konsole/krunner
>

This does not help on KDE 4.3.4. The configuration sections look like this:

[Containments][3][Applets][9]
geometry=4,840,57,57
immutability=1
plugin=battery
zvalue=6

[Containments][3][Applets][9][Configuration]
showBatteryString=true
showRemainingTime=true

[Elias Probst (eliasp)]

Please read this blogpost:
http://vizzzion.org/blog/2009/11/battery-improvements-in-kde-plasma-4-4/

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

there is another reason, why the remaining time display is very usefull:

when power is plugged in, it shows the remaining recharging time for me(I think quite precise, because it not depends on usage).

[Simply-bugz (simply-bugz)]

Tha(In reply to comment #11)
> You can edit a config file to re-enable this feature:
>
> edit the file "~/.kde[4]/share/config/plasma-desktop-appletsrc"
>
> search for the string "plugin=battery"
>
> for me it is in the section
> "[Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126]"
>
> the go to the corresponding configuration section, for me
> [Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126][Configuration]
>
> and add the line:
> showRemainingTime=true
>
> then do "pkill plasma-desktop" and "plasma-desktop" from konsole/krunner
>
> the time estimation for me really seems worse than the one from ms-windows, so
> perhaps it is possible to improve the backends.

Thank you very much for the option!
The only extra thing I needed to add was section heading.

The result:
The time estimation is close (within a few minutes) to values from the script I coded in the mean time but that makes sense if it is using floating average.
I'll see how well it works in the long run, especially when I'm fighting for the last 10min :D.

Maybe there is an option to display time on MouseOver but that's a minor.

I must be lucky with my hardware. On my eee pc 901 I can read
/sys/devices/LNXSYSTM:00/LNXSYBUS:00/PNP0A08:00/PNP0C0A:00/power_supply/BAT0/uevent
and simply calculate time = 3600 * charge / current. Which is quite responsive (to CPU load and screen brightness changes for example) and is quite accurate.

[Adam Porter (alphapapa)]

Please fix this. It is a necessary, universal feature. It's sad that KDE removed it, and removed the UI for it too (one simple checkbox). You, Kubuntu devs, have the power to right this absurd wrong that was perpetrated against the users of KDE. All you have to do is make a simple patch to undo the SVN commit that emasculated this software. Don't pass the buck to KDE, who have already made the wrong decision. Do the right thing and fix this.

[Adam Porter (alphapapa)]

Sadly, whoever's in charge over at Kubuntu is refusing to patch this feature back in.

The only rationale that I've seen for removing this feature is that it's not accurate. However, that's not true. The time remaining is provided by the hardware through ACPI. It's very accurate on my laptop, within a range of 10 minutes.

Yes, if the power usage changes, the estimation may not be updated for 5-10 seconds. So what? If I start playing a DVD and then, halfway through the movie, I want to see if there's enough battery power to finish the movie, what good is a percentage going to do me?

Every other OS on the planet displays the time remaining, or has the option to do so. KDE has always been about giving the user the power to choose. It's bad enough that this feature was disabled by default, but removing the checkbox setting is unbelievable. In the name of "simplicity"?! It would only make three checkboxes! I thought only GNOME intentionally neutered their UI. Just when I thought KDE 4 was ready for primetime, now it looks like KDE 3.5 is still more USEFUL.

Please, let common sense prevail, and put this basic functionality back in KDE!

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

There are already some patched versions on kde-look:

http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/battery+plasmoid+with+remaining+time?content=120309

and

http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/Battery+Time+Remaining?content=123767

[Adam Porter (alphapapa)]

Thanks for sharing these links.

On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 15:17, H.H. <email address hidden> wrote:
> https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=204545
>
>
>
>
>
> --- Comment #17 from H.H. <cyberbeat gmx de>  2010-05-11 22:17:05 ---
> There are already some patched versions on kde-look:
>
> http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/battery+plasmoid+with+remaining+time?content=120309
>
> and
>
> http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/Battery+Time+Remaining?content=123767
>
> --
> Configure bugmail: https://bugs.kde.org/userprefs.cgi?tab=email
> ------- You are receiving this mail because: -------
> You are on the CC list for the bug.
>

[Harald Sitter (apachelogger)]

As explained in the appropriate KDE SVN commit, the calculation of remaining time is in most cases nothing to go by, in fact it is mostly so far off that it is better to not indicate the "remaining time" at all. So removing it for the time being (that is until someone actually implements an algorithm that manages to take most of the important variables into account) is not only sound and sane, it is the only appropriate solution.

Quite frankly, the only other option would be to remove the applet completely.

Say you are a car manufacturer and speedometer is actually never showing the correct speed, do you really think that deploying a product with broken key functionality like that is a good idea?
This basically applies here too. Just that the presented functionality is no where as important to the correct operation of a computer than the speedometer is to the operation of a car. So instead of removing the whole applet, KDE just removed the broken part of the functionality.

It might indeed be useful to have a display of how much time is remaining, but then it must be close to reality, otherwise people might just as well misuse the computer as they would misuse a car with broken speedometer. If your battery applets says that you have 2 hours left but indeed battery is going down after half an hour, then clearly something is wrong.

And that problem is not easy to solve. See, the remaining time is a rather complex thing to claim a value on. It is a prediction of the future, unlike the current value of battery energy, that is an as-is value and leaving interpretation to you. Of course you might just as well say, that you still can do this and that because your battery is still half full, and then end up dead after half an hour, but that is a problem with your interpretation.

So, unless you come up with a way to predict the remaining time with a close-to reality turn out, I do not see this feature return, then again I am not working on this in KDE.

That said, the reason we are not undoing this is because "undoing" or "patching" as harmless as those words might sound involve (almost) exponentially growing developer time spent in maintenance and management. Something we can not and will not invest for a "feature" that is in reality broken anyway. So if you want to see this again, then you must go convince the one who removed it to begin with.

Both KDE and Kubuntu acknowledge the fact that some people want this functionality and that is exactly why you still can activate it using the config file. Kubuntu however is in no position to argue about KDE's decision here.

[Adam Porter (alphapapa)]

Harald, thanks for your reply.

I don't understand why you say that the algorithm is not accurate. I
can run yacpi or powertop and get estimations that are accurate enough
to be very useful. I can boot into Windows and get useful estimations
from the tray icon. I can run KDE 3.5 and get useful estimations from
guidance-power-manager. When it says there's 2 hours remaining, there
are 2 hours remaining. When it says there's 5 minutes remaining,
there's 5 minutes remaining. I can test and prove that. If certain
KDE developers have hardware that fails to provide accurate
estimations, that is no reason to remove the feature from the KDE
software. That is reason to complain to the laptop manufacturer, or
get a new laptop.

Who is to say that the estimates are bad but the user himself?

On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 15:14, Harald Sitter <email address hidden> wrote:
> As explained in the appropriate KDE SVN commit, the calculation of
> remaining time is in most cases nothing to go by, in fact it is mostly
> so far off that it is better to not indicate the "remaining time" at
> all. So removing it for the time being (that is until someone actually
> implements an algorithm that manages to take most of the important
> variables into account) is not only sound and sane, it is the only
> appropriate solution.
>
> Quite frankly, the only other option would be to remove the applet
> completely.
>
> Say you are a car manufacturer and speedometer is actually never showing the correct speed, do you really think that deploying a product with broken key functionality like that is a good idea?
> This basically applies here too. Just that the presented functionality is no where as important to the correct operation of a computer than the speedometer is to the operation of a car. So instead of removing the whole applet, KDE just removed the broken part of the functionality.
>
> It might indeed be useful to have a display of how much time is
> remaining, but then it must be close to reality, otherwise people might
> just as well misuse the computer as they would misuse a car with broken
> speedometer. If your battery applets says that you have 2 hours left but
> indeed battery is going down after half an hour, then clearly something
> is wrong.
>
> And that problem is not easy to solve. See, the remaining time is a
> rather complex thing to claim a value on. It is a prediction of the
> future, unlike the current value of battery energy, that is an as-is
> value and leaving interpretation to you. Of course you might just as
> well say, that you still can do this and that because your battery is
> still half full, and then end up dead after half an hour, but that is a
> problem with your interpretation.
>
> So, unless you come up with a way to predict the remaining time with a
> close-to reality turn out, I do not see this feature return, then again
> I am not working on this in KDE.
>
> That said, the reason we are not undoing this is because "undoing" or
> "patching" as harmless as those words might sound involve (almost)
> exponentially growing developer time spent in maintenance and
> management. Something we can not and will not invest for a "feature"
> th...

[Harald Sitter (apachelogger)]

Apparently I did not make myself clear enough. We are not going to change since it is too much maintenance overhead as this would become a long-term derivation from upstream. This is not going to change, if you want this functionality back, convince the KDE developers.

[molecule-eye (niburu1)]

(In reply to comment #11)
> You can edit a config file to re-enable this feature:
>
> edit the file "~/.kde[4]/share/config/plasma-desktop-appletsrc"
>
> search for the string "plugin=battery"
>
> for me it is in the section
> "[Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126]"
>
> the go to the corresponding configuration section, for me
> [Containments][3][Applets][60][Configuration][Applets][126][Configuration]
>
> and add the line:
> showRemainingTime=true
>
> then do "pkill plasma-desktop" and "plasma-desktop" from konsole/krunner
>
> the time estimation for me really seems worse than the one from ms-windows, so
> perhaps it is possible to improve the backends.

For some reason this half broke in my latest update to KDE 4.4.5. Now instead of showing the remaining time on mouseover, it shows the percentage again. However, it does show the remaining time if you click on the plasmoid to display more detailed information. I wonder why it doesn't show on mouseover anymore. Is there something else in the config file that determines what's shown on mouseover?

[Lamarque (lamarque)]

*** Bug 205549 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

[Aldo "xoen" Giambelluca (xoen)]

I hope you don't get me wrong but I think this bug is an usability problem, my battery has a huge capacity but for people is important to have an estimate of the remaing battery life.

I personally open a terminal and use acpi -V, but it's not a solution for everyone.

I know is a rude estimate but it give me *an idea of how many time I have*.

(I love your work and I thank you)

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

I am the author of this fork, and try stay in sync with the newest kde-4.x versions.

http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/battery+plasmoid+with+remaining+time?content=120309

Please imagine a voting among kde users for this feature, in which is also made clear the disadvantages of the remaining-time-display-method (it may jump in dependency of cpu/screen-brightness/..). I guess (I am quite sure!) that nevertheless most user would LOVE an option to display the remaining time. (would it be possible to have such a voting?) it is only an option! no default!

I would really see the devs reconsidering about this. And for newbies and fear of getting bugreports about wrong remaining time..perhaps it would be possible to show a tooltip/question-mark behind the remaining time option, that would "warn" the user of this "very bad" choice ;-)

[FriedChicken (domlyons)]

Maybe it would be the best to show *two* estimations:

* Estimation over a longer time period (for example 20-30 minutes): Estimation for a continuous workload

* Short time estimation (~30 seconds): For noncontinuous workloads or if the workload has changed (for example notebook was nearly idling around and then avideo encoding process is launched => long-term estimation would show a too optimistic value)

PowerTOP does something similar to that.

[Kde-2011-08 (kde-2011-08)]

> Maybe it would be the best to show *two* estimations
>

No, that would only confuse people.

[1lukas1 (1lukas1)]

As of KDE SC 4.6, opensuse 11.4, the remaining time is already shown (and quite accurately). As far as I understand, decision to show or not remaining time is upon distribution.

So isn't this bug supposed to be closed.

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

I think this bug is about the choice for this by the user, not the distribution.

[Stevebm-l (stevebm-l)]

What is needed is an estimate of the time remaining given current usage, so the user can see how watching a movie or recompiling the kernel is affecting his remaining battery life. If the estimate fluctuates with different usage patterns, that is the desired behavior. A commuter wants to know if he has to change what he is doing for the battery to last until his train reaches his destination, for instance.

In my brief experience of 15 years, estimates of time remaining have only been way off when the battery was dying, but that is a symptom that should not be hidden from the user. I believe people have come to expect an estimate of time remaining when they use a laptop. I also believe it is common knowledge that your mileage may vary, but weathermen still predict the weather and traders still buy stock, even though they are not 100% sure what the future will bring. The user should at least have the option, and currently in KDE 4.6, adding showRemainingTime=true to plasma-desktop-appletsrc doesn't add the time to the battery icon.

[U26 (u26)]

This option exists.

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

@David Edmundson: are you sure, that a GUI-Option(!) does exist? For me not in kde-4.8.3

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

On Thu, Jun 7, 2012 at 5:36 PM, David Edmundson
<email address hidden> wrote:
> --- Comment #28 from David Edmundson <email address hidden> ---
> This option exists.

Well, I can merge the two battery icons into one, but the estimated
time remaining only considers the time until the currently discharging
battery is empty.

[U26 (u26)]

2 battery remaining times is a different bug here:
https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=253453 which is not closed.

[Adam Porter (alphapapa)]

On Thursday, June 7, 2012, Cyberbeat-p <email address hidden> wrote:

> @David Edmundson: are you sure, that a GUI-Option(!) does exist? For me
> not in kde-4.8.3

Me neither.

[Stevebm-l (stevebm-l)]

(In reply to comment #28)
> This option exists.

This option does not exist. There is no way I can find in KDE 4.8.3, short of patching the source code, to display the time remaining on the battery icon, so that it can be seen with a glance at the notification area. This bug needs to be reopened.

[U26 (u26)]

We were referring to 4.8.80 (KDE 4.9)

[Stevebm-l (stevebm-l)]

(In reply to comment #33)
> We were referring to 4.8.80 (KDE 4.9)

I just tried KDE 4.9 beta from Project Neon, and the battery icon is much worse. There doesn't seem to be any option to show any information on the icon, either percent remaining or time remaining, just the icon with a few blocks showing charge state, which is a very coarse scale. You have to click on the icon to see any information. There is no more information at a glance, unless the option is hidden somewhere where I can't find it. I am becoming concerned about useful features that keep disappearing from successive releases of KDE. Should this bug be reopened to provide information on the icon, or should I open a new one?

[U26 (u26)]

Time remaining information is in the panel that pops up, please do open any other problems as new bug reports. Use a different bug for each bug/feature as otherwise it's a problem for us to keep track.

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

for your information: currently there exist 3 forks of battery plasmoid showing the remaining-time-option inc config-gui. alone that should give to think about adding the option in the original plasmoid gui again.

[Cyberbeat-p (cyberbeat-p)]

I forgot to say: the forks are all on kde-apps.org

[Torsten Römer (dode)]

I am using KDE 4.9.3 and there is no estimated time information in the popup. It was there in the previous release of Kubuntu, I think it was KDE 4.8.x, and it worked pretty accurate, so it is a bit a shame that it is missing now.

A side note: When clicking on the battery icon, the popup is partially obscured by the tooltip, and it is necessary to move the mouse away or wait to get rid of it. A really small annoyance, but still spoiling the usability a bit.

[tekstr1der (tekstr1der)]

Time-remaining informatin is still missing from the battery plasmoid in KDE 4.10.

Why is this listed as resolved/fixed? Must yet another bug be raised for this same issue?

Also, it's not a wishlist item, but rather a regression. This function was working properly in previous releases.

[U26 (u26)]

You are correct. It was never fixed, and won't be due to a decision by someone in the Plasma team. I've updated the bug to be more accurate

Please use the "Enhanced Batter Plasmoid" available through "Get New Widgets". It's written by the original Plasma batter maintainer.

[Torsten Römer (dode)]

Great, thanks for this hint! Nice to have the estimated remaining time back.

[Adam Porter (alphapapa)]

On Sun, Feb 10, 2013 at 7:18 AM, U26 <email address hidden> wrote:
> You are correct. It was never fixed, and won't be due to a decision by
> someone in the Plasma team. I've updated the bug to be more accurate

Mustn't give the users what they want. Regressions--and this is one,
even worse being intentional!--should be unacceptable.

I don't understand KDE sometimes. If a Qt bug affects KDE and makes
the entire UI crash on login, it's marked "RESOLVED UPSTREAM" and KDE
does nothing about it. But if a hardware-specific issue results in
KDE displaying a number that might not be completely accurate because
it's simply reporting what the hardware says, KDE removes the feature
completely for all users.