norbusan/rfkill-applet

rfkill applet
version 0.8

Access to the rfkill switches on the system

Warning: I never programmed python, nor pygtk, never any applet, never
dbus/hal, so please do expect this applet to make your computer disappear
in flames.

Code sources and thanks:
- gfreqlet.sf.net for pygtk applets
- dbus/hal interface by trial and error with loads of help from the
  plasmoid-applet-killswitch of Eva Brucherseifer
  (see http://www.basyskom.org/~eva/log_installation_vaio_z21vnx.html)
- rfkill access mode from the source code of rfkill user space program
  and thanks to hints by Johannes Berg <johannes AT sipsolutions DOT net>


Installation:
- you have to install Python interface to GNOME Applet installed
  On Debian/Ubuntu the package name is python-gnomeapplet
- put rfkill-applet.py into /usr/bin/rfkill-applet  (no .py extension!)
  and make it executable (chmod a+x /usr/bin/rfkill-applet)
- put rfkill-applet.server into /usr/lib/bonobo/servers/ and make it
  executable (chmod a+x /usr/lib/bonobo/servers/rfkill-applet.server)
- put rfkill-applet.png into /usr/share/pixmaps
- put rfkill-applet-hardoff.png into /usr/share/pixmaps
- put rfkill-applet.config into 
     either /etc/rfkill-applet.config
     or     $HOME/.rfkill-applet.config
- restart gnome session
- add the applet

Sys file access:
Since version 0.8 rfkill-applet can be used to turn on/off "settings"
in the /sys file hierarchy, of in fact, everywhere. See examples
that make sense for the sony laptop in the example configuration file.
If you need write access as user you have to specify some udev rules
that allow write access to these files.

By default rfkill-applet will first try to use /dev/rfkill if available
and read/writeable. This access method is the preferred one as it is
less resource intensive (no need to wake up every 3 secs). This interface
to the rfkill subsystem was introduced in the kernel in 2.6.31-rc series.
In case /dev/rfkill is not available or not useable rfkill-applet falls
back to HAL/DBUS access.

To configure /dev/rfkill access I recommend:
- adding a group rfkill
- adding the users that should be allowed to change rfkills to this group
- adding a line to one of the config files for udev (or creating a new one),
  eg /etc/udev/rules.d/99-local.rules with one line:
  	KERNEL=="rfkill", NAME="rfkill", OWNER="root", GROUP="rfkill", MODE="660"


HAL/DBUS is normally already configured so that each user can access
the rfkill stuff.


Bugs: many, help needed, suggestions welcome!

Copyright (C) 2009, 2010, 2011 Norbert Preining <[email protected]>
Licensed under GPLv3