Re: [PATCH] Delay full modem initialization until SIM is unlocked

[Dennis Noordsij <dennis noordsij helsinki fi>]

Tambet Ingo schreef:
> On Sat, May 24, 2008 at 11:02 PM, Dennis Noordsij
> <dennis noordsij helsinki fi> wrote:
>   
>> Some modems return ERROR to most AT commands when the SIM is still locked, specifically the "ATZ E0" in the initialization.
>>
>> The attached patch modifies the initialization sequence to disable the local echo (the E0 part) first, perform the SIM check, and only then continue with the "ATZ" and further network registration, etc.
>>
>> For me, on fresh boot (SIM locked), this NetworkManager now unlocks the SIM (it has my PIN in the keyring) and makes a perfect connection every time.
>>     
>
> The patch looks good to me, thanks!
>   

Hi!

I'd like to further improve easy of use with gsm devices, but it would
help if someone could point me in the right direction (i.e. what needs
to be touched to implement this, does it need HAL support, does it
belong in NM, or nm-applet specific?) or comment on the following:

- The device supports being "on" and "off". I.e., at startup it could be
allowed to just connect to a network. Then, setting up a data connection
will be very fast since it doesn't have to find the network first. The
nm-applet would allow you to disable the modem the same way you disable
wireless; the modem can be told to turn off its radio and save power
that way, and similarly will join a network again once the radio is
turned back on. I think this applies to all gsm modems (AT+CFUN
command), so perhaps does not need special HAL attributes.

- The init can be improved a bit, i.e. making sure the settings are sane
and the radio is actually on (otherwise NM will loop forever waiting for
a network to be joined).

- It would be nice if the nm-applet could display which network is being
used (once a data connection has been made) and wether it's the home
network or roaming.

- Similarly, it would be nice to know which data mode is being used.

- This device (Dell branded Novatell EU780D) has a second port which can
be used for status queries. It uses a binary protocol which turns out to
be AT commands over a variation of the Brew protocol (bitpim was helpful
to find the crc algorithm etc), Actually the Windows driver does
everything except the actual dialing and PPP over the second port. It
means with this device you are able to monitor the signal strength and
battery status (in case you're using a mobile phone as a modem over usb
or bluetooth) even while you have a data connection up. This would need
changes I guess in a lot of places, HAL to identify and tag this modem
as having this capability; a small lib to do the AT request/response
encoding, etc, but it would be really nice to have.

- Not GSM specific, but relevant since data traffic is usually not
flat-fee, to have sent/received byte counters. (i.e. is this something
NM would broadcast over dbus or would nm-applet just query the device
itself?)

Many thanks for any pointers,
Cheers
Dennis