ThinkWiki - User contributions [en]

Talk:Installing Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) on a ThinkPad T61

2007-09-21T13:05:01Z

Aerials: /* Touchpad issues */

==New Nvidia Driver released==

http://www.nvidia.com/object/linux_display_ia32_100.14.19.html

Time to test, supposedly it stabilizes compiz. When I get home tonight I will write up install instructions and what it fixes if someone doesn't beat me to it.

: The new NVIDIA driver doesn't fix the compiz+3d accel bug, causing X to crash, at least not on my system. I have the NVIDIA Quadro FX570M. I've removed compiz from my system since I value a buggy NVIDIA driver more than cheesy desktop effects. [[User:Rybu|Rybu]]

== Core 2 Duo running at 800 mHz? ==
The applications Sysinfo and PowerTOP both say that my CPU is running at 800 MHz. When I first open Sysinfo, it says a number around 2 GHz but it then drops to 800 MHz. Sysinfo says something about laptop CPU frequency changing (being "dynamic"), but it remains static at 800 MHz. [[User:SteveSims|SteveSims]] 00:51, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

This is normal. This is the "frequency scaling" feature of the laptop. Whenever the processors aren't being used they drop down to 800MHz to conserve power. All you have to do is run some CPU-intensive task and you'll see them jump up to 2GHz. There's a little applet that you can add to the top panel called "CPU Frequency Scaling Monitor" that will let you watch the processor speed up and down in real time: Right-click on the top panel bar and select "Add to Panel" to find it; it's under "System and Hardware" --[[User:Mike Richards|Mike Richards]] 06:31, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

==Desktop_Applet crash on login after update (2007-09-16) with x86 and AMD64 versions (Fixed in daily build 20070918, reappears in 20070919.1)==
I found out that my Thinkpad T61 is a 64-bit machine so I installed the 64-bit version of Ubuntu 7.10 Tribe 5. I tried updating the machine, which worked fine until it had to configure and install my updates. With about 12 minutes remaining it hangs up and the terminal within the Update Manager says that some components must be restarted (and the update hangs) so I restart my computer. When I log in, I get an error message that says something about a Deskbar_Applet not working, and it asks me if I want to delete it. Regardless of my selection, I can no longer update the machine nor run Applications --> Add/Remove. I thought it must be a difference between AMD64 and Intel's x86-64 near-clone, so I re-installed the 32-bit version. When I updated, the same thing happened after I updated it. I'm guessing this is a bug withing the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUI GUI] or the package manager.

However, I can load Firefox from my panel just fine. [[User:SteveSims|SteveSims]] 05:01, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

:I had a similar problem. I found if I just avoided updating the system until after a full reboot, things were fine. [[User:Rybu|Rybu]]

::The most recent update (9-18-2007) solves this problem.

:::The problem appears again in 20070919.1, at least the AMD64 version (I haven't tested the x86-32 version). [[User:SteveSims|SteveSims]] 21:49, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

::::And it still exists as of September 20th. [[User:SteveSims|SteveSims]] 04:53, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

==Touchpad issues==
After updating on September 18th from the original x86 Tribe 5, tapping the touchpad hard no longer clicks, and the right edge no longer scrolls. [[User:SteveSims|SteveSims]] 01:59, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
:Go to System -> Preferences -> Mouse. In the Touchpad tab you can activate tap to click and vertical scrolling. --[[User:Aerials|aerials]] 13:05, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

==Daily build 20070918 AMD64 won't install==
Double-clicking on the Install icon in the LiveCD does nothing. No window loads, I can't install it from the LiveCD. [[User:SteveSims|SteveSims]] 01:59, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

==Brightness buttons==

The brightness buttons used to work on my system. But now that I have 2 displays, they don't work anymore. When I first installed Ubuntu 7.10 the brightness buttons did not work but I found some tips on-line to enable them... unfortunately I don't remember what those tips were... silly me... I'll dig up the info and put it into the wiki, soon. [[User:Rybu|Rybu]]

==Compiling existing information==

This [[http://gentoo-wiki.com/HARDWARE_Lenovo_Thinkpad_T61]] link has some useful information that is worthwhile compiling into the wiki here. [[User:Rybu|Rybu]]

==Desktop effects don't consistenly work==
I installed new themes and updated today and suddenly the new desktop effects that were added to 7.10 don't work.

However, Deskbar_Applet doesn't crash with the update, even though it does with today's most current LiveCD. Touchpad issues still exist. [[User:SteveSims|SteveSims]] 06:37, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Talk:Installing Ubuntu 6.10 on a ThinkPad X41 Tablet

2006-09-27T19:51:39Z

Aerials: Screen Rotation

== NetBoot Installation Move ==

I moved the NetBoot portion of the documentation, as it's part of isntallation instructions. The pre-installation notes were intended for README-like things, not so much actual procedure.

== Screen Rotation ==

I followed your guide to create the screen rotation scripts/events, and after acpi force-reload and restart it works just fine. But when I reboot the machine, I have to reload and restart acpi again, otherwise it won't work.

----
--[[User:Aerials|aerials]] 21:51, 27 September 2006 (CEST)

Talk:How to enable integrated fingerprint reader with BioAPI

2006-07-09T13:52:10Z

Aerials: /* Don't ask for finger scan when lid closed */

== chmod 777 -R /usr/local/var/bioapi/ ==

Is the above necessary? I just made a debian package of xscreensaver with the patch applied, and when using the bioapi debian pacakge from [http://www.qrivy.net/~michael/temp/ Michael R. Crusoe's site] which has this directory put in /usr/var/bioapi I had not to change the permissions to world-writeable there. Write access to the logfile and usb device are necessary, but that directory works with 755 as well (even though it comes with 777 in Michael's package), and all files and subdirectories are 644/755 too.

--[[User:Spiney|spiney]] 00:08, 11 Nov 2005 (CET)
----

== Qt Compilation Success ==

Here it worked with qt ;)

--

I didn't get it to work anyway, but I'm curious about your Qt version(s) as it seemed to want Qt 3 when I was playing with it.

--[[User:Keegan|keegan]] 05:07, 24 Dec 2005 (CET)

== using absolute paths for commands ==

I don't know whether using absolute paths in the articles is a good idea, at least not for tools like {{cmd|lsusb|}} which are not established utilities (i.e. used for more than a decade or something ;)) and happen to be in different locations in different distributions. E.g. said {{cmd|lsusb|}} resides in {{path|/usr/sbin|}} on Debian systems.

--[[User:Spiney|spiney]] 16:45, 12 Nov 2005 (CET)
----

I'm using debian testing and it's in {{path|/usr/bin|}}. I agree that the confusion is bad; dropping the absolute paths and adding a general note about checking {{cmd|$PATH|}} in case of problems is probably good.

--[[User:keegan|keegan]]

== BioAPI error #3 ==

Its kind of strage it used to work with everythig (kdm,console,lock,etc)
Now it only works with kdm. It allways gives back:

pam_bioapi[8113]: Unable to initialize Bioapi framework, BioAPI error #:3.

Even when I set the right permissions on /proc/bus/usb.

I am able to run the Sample program as normal user after setting the permissions, but when I change within a user session by su I amnot able to run the Sample program a also get an error Code #3.

From an other terminal (alt+strg+Fx) I am able to run the Sample program but at the login I still get the error #3.

I cant remember to have changed anything an d bevor I was able to login in a console with my fingerprint now only kdm is working even kde lock-session
isnt working anymore.

Any suggestions ?

==Permission errors exclusive to xscreensaver==

I followed the instructions above and got everything working, including non-root programs like xscreensaver. However, the script to change usbfs permissions is finicky and fails to work with a lot of things like suspend/resume. Therefore, I switched to specifying <tt>devgid=108,devmode=0660,busgid=108,busmode=0770,listgid=108,listmode=0660</tt> as mount parameters for usbfs, where group 108 is a group I created and added my normal user to. This seems like a much better way of doing things, and it almost works. However, xscreensaver (using the newer patch) gives the familiar <tt>Unable to load BioAPI BSP with UUID of <nowiki>{</nowiki>5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350<nowiki>}</nowiki>, BioAPI error #194d.</tt> error in {{path|/var/log/auth.log|}}. I don't think this is a straightfoward permissions problem because
<ul>
<li>the permissions in {{path|/proc/bus/usb|}} are correct by inspection</li>
<li>I can write to the device file as my normal user</li>
<li>other programs like {{cmd|test_verify-pam_bioapi|}} and [http://pamtester.sourceforge.net/ {{cmd|pamtester|}}] work as my normal user</li>
<li>the weirdest one: xscreensaver works when the {{cmd|xscreensaver|}} daemon is launched from within {{cmd|strace|}}. It's still running as my normal user ({{cmd|strace|}} is not setuid root). I have absolutely no idea what would cause this. I thought it might be an environment issue, but the difference in environment between the {{cmd|strace|}} session and my normal session is trivial.</li>
</ul>

At this point I'm hoping it's something dumb, but I'm out of ideas. The {{cmd|xscreensaver|}} error is <tt>pam_authenticate (...) ==> 7 (Authentication failure)</tt>, for the record.

--[[User:keegan|keegan]]
----

Could you provide all the log lines between pam_start and pam_end when running {{cmd|xscreensaver -verbose|}}?

BTW, the idea with using the mount options for usbfs is very good, maybe you should add that info to the article page? I use the permission changing script without problems, also after resume, but the usbfs version is probably easier to set up, most people will be able to find {{path|/etc/fstab|}}.

--[[User:Spiney|spiney]] 10:12, 23 Dec 2005 (CET)
----
<pre>
xscreensaver: 20:56:01: alternative_pam: 1 -> pam service: xscreensaver-alternative
xscreensaver: 20:56:01: pam_start ("xscreensaver-alternative", "keegan", ...) ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:01: pam_set_item (p, PAM_TTY, ":0.0") ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:01: PAM ECHO_OFF("Password: ") ==> password
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: pam_authenticate (...) ==> 7 (Authentication failure)
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: pam_end (...) ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: prompting for password.
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: 0: creating password dialog.
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: 0: mouse is at 442,412.
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: grabbing server...
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: 0: ungrabbing mouse (was 0x48).
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: 0: grabbing mouse on 0xe0002b... GrabSuccess.
xscreensaver: 20:56:03: ungrabbing server.
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: alternative_pam: 12582928 -> pam service: xscreensaver
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: pam_start ("xscreensaver", "keegan", ...) ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: pam_set_item (p, PAM_TTY, ":0.0") ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: PAM ECHO_OFF("Password: ") ==> password
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: pam_authenticate (...) ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: pam_acct_mgmt (...) ==> 9 (Authentication service cannot retrieve authentication info.)
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: pam_setcred (...) ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: pam_end (...) ==> 0 (Success)
xscreensaver: 20:56:05: password correct.
</pre>
So we've got the first attempt with {{cmd|pam_bioapi|}}, which fails immediately (no sign of the GUI fingerprint prompt, nor a "silent" chance to swipe the finger as with xdm), then the fallback to {{cmd|pam_unix|}} which succeeds. Earlier I had xscreensaver set up to only try {{cmd|pam_bioapi|}}, with essentially the same result -- it gives up on pam entirely and does unix auth itself.

I'd really like to strace the pam module and see what it's attempting to do to {{path|/proc/bus/usb|}}, but as that actually fixes the problem I'm kinda at a loss. Maybe there's some kernel option to print debugging info for usbfs? I'd be all for changing the article to suggest using mount options in {{path|/etc/fstab|}}, if it weren't for this one weird bug. Has anyone else had the same problem?

-- [[User:keegan|keegan]]

Same here, I had the whole setup workin flawlessly (I really need to get that 'never-touch-a-running-system' mantra burnt into the back of my hands), but after a fresh install of the same distro (Ubuntu) and following the same procedure to get things working i get exactly this behaviour. Login works (now even with multifinger, although there are other issues with that), I can use test_verify-pam_bioapi as a user. and the stock xscreensaver works, albeit only after entering a bogus password first.
The patched xscreensaver works when run within a strace (Now that sucks) but fails otherwise. And as i said before, I had this working...

----
<pre>
open("/dev/bus/usb", O_RDONLY|O_NONBLOCK|O_LARGEFILE|O_DIRECTORY) = 13
fstat64(13, {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0755, st_size=140, ...}) = 0
fcntl64(13, F_SETFD, FD_CLOEXEC) = 0
getdents64(13, /* 7 entries */, 4096) = 168
getdents64(13, /* 0 entries */, 4096) = 0
close(13) = 0
open("/dev/bus/usb/003", O_RDONLY|O_NONBLOCK|O_LARGEFILE|O_DIRECTORY) = 13
fstat64(13, {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0755, st_size=80, ...}) = 0
fcntl64(13, F_SETFD, FD_CLOEXEC) = 0
getdents64(13, /* 4 entries */, 4096) = 96
open("/dev/bus/usb/003/002", O_RDWR) = -1 EACCES (Permission denied)
open("/dev/bus/usb/003/002", O_RDONLY) = 14
ioctl(14, USBDEVFS_CONNECTINFO, 0xafd5bd34) = -1 EPERM (Operation not permitted)
read(14, "\22\1\0\1\0\0\0\10\203\4\26 \1\0\1\2\0\1", 18) = 18
read(14, "\t\2\'\0\1\1\0\240", 8) = 8
read(14, "2\t\4\0\0\3\377\0\0\0\7\5\201\2@\0\0\7\5\2\2@\0\0\7\5\203"..., 31) = 31
close(14) = 0
</pre>

Here is all the excitement from the strace on xscreensaver. As I originally thought, you cannot get away with just playing with the proc entries :P You also need to deal with the counterpart in /dev. We can wrap up all the permissions issues with a single UDEV rule:

<pre>
# fingerprint fun
BUS=="usb", DRIVER=="usb", SYSFS{product}=="Biometric Coprocessor", GROUP="bioapi", SYMLINK="misc/fingerprint", RUN+="/bin/sh -c 'chgrp bioapi /proc/$RESULT; chmod g+rw /proc/$RESULT'"
</pre>

I created a 'bioapi' group and configured pam to add groups to anyone logging in ''locally''. Now all you need to do is amend the pam configuraion files below. We use 'wdm', but of course its as applicable for all those resource hungry touchy-feely gdm/kdm folk out there too ;)

/etc/security/group.conf
<pre>
# local group settings
login; tty*; *; al0000-2400; audio,floppy,video,cdrom,nvram,plugdev,bioapi
wdm; :*; *; al0000-2400; audio,floppy,video,cdrom,nvram,plugdev,bioapi
</pre>

/etc/pam.d/login
<pre>
[snipped]

# group *has* to go here
auth optional pam_group.so

# fingerprint action
auth sufficient /usr/local/lib/security/pam_bioapi.so {5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350} /etc/bioapi1.10/pam/

# Standard Un*x authentication.
@include common-auth

# This allows certain extra groups to be granted to a user
# based on things like time of day, tty, service, and user.
# Please edit /etc/security/group.conf to fit your needs
# (Replaces the `CONSOLE_GROUPS' option in login.defs)
#auth optional pam_group.so

[snipped]
</pre>

/etc/pam.d/wdm
<pre>
#%PAM-1.0
auth required pam_nologin.so
auth required pam_env.so

# local tweak
auth optional pam_group.so

# fingerprint action
auth sufficient /usr/local/lib/security/pam_bioapi.so {5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350} /etc/bioapi1.10/pam/

@include common-auth
@include common-account
@include common-session
</pre>

'''N.B.''' as with all pam related things, the order is important

-- [[User:Jim diGriz|Jim diGriz]]
----

==Driver Expiring!!!==
Don't anyone notice that both betas of the UPEK driver is expiring in
about a month in the new year, Jan 1st 2006? They really mean it!
I set my computer date to next year and get a message "the driver has expired" when using fingerprint reader! This is a grave threat to our computer lifestyle, i.e. for those of us who got it working and use it
daily:)
Is there any workaround other than setting the date back a year when
new year come and wait for new driver? Is there a way to figure out where exactly in the driver it checked the date and how? The must have set it
somewhere in file libtfmessbsp.so, but it is binary and I can't figure out how to Reverse Engineer it.

---Jiang

Yes, the beta driver will expire. The final version (which is due REALLY soon now) will not.

Sumedha

Any news? Just 9 days left to expiry. --[[User:Thinker|Thinker]] 21:36, 22 Dec 2005 (CET)

The final is out, get it at [http://www.upek.com/support/dl_linux_bsp.asp UPEK's download page]. And how does one edit the industry watch section of the main page?

--[[User:Spiney|spiney]] 21:39, 22 Dec 2005 (CET)

Ah, great! Both the article page and the driver page it points to are out of date... For the news, just follow the "[[ThinkWiki:News|News]]" link in the main page.

--[[User:Thinker|Thinker]] 21:44, 22 Dec 2005 (CET)

As this is now very soon I've updated the article page to link to the final driver, which is better in a few ways anyway. This is unless anyone minds (are there any unresolved issues with the final that don't exist in the betas?).

--[[User:Keegan|keegan]] 05:06, 24 Dec 2005 (CET)

== Updated xscreensaver patch ==

I've tried to address some usability issues with the old patch, e.g. that it calls the PAM bioapi module twice before falling back to the normal authentication methods. It can be found on my [http://linux.spiney.org/debian_gnu_linux_on_an_ibm_thinkpad_t43p_fingerprint_reader Fingerprint Reader] page, feedback is very welcome.

--[[User:Spiney|spiney]] 20:36, 22 Dec 2005 (CET)
----

== Fingerprint or password ==

Is there any way to have PAM accept either a password or a finger swipe, right away? Sometimes one is more convenient, sometimes the other, so and it's a lot of trouble to wait for the UPEK scanner prompt and then cancel it in order to reach the password entry.

--[[User:Thinker|Thinker]] 19:27, 24 Dec 2005 (CET)

== KDE screensaver ==

If you get the following in {{path|/var/log/secure}} when you try to unlock the KDE screensaver, it means you forgot to set the USB device permissions.
localhost pam_bioapi[24981]: Unable to load BioAPI BSP with UUID of {5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350}, BioAPI error #194d.

--[[User:Thinker|Thinker]] 21:21, 24 Dec 2005 (CET)
----

== fingerprint reader in action. ==

small video with fingerprint reader in action with login: http://chao.ch/tmp/mov01302.mpg

--[[User:62.202.35.30|62.202.35.30]] 17:57, 29 Dec 2005 (CET)

==A little feedback...==
...for all the editors of this article:

"[[How to enable the fingerprint reader]] over at ThinkWiki.org is some real exhaustive documentation for getting the fingerprint scanner working on the ThinkPads. There is also a troubleshooting section towards the end that might be very useful to anyone messing around with it.

Thanks to those responsible for taking the time to write up this excellent guide."

Those thanks come from [http://linuxbiometrics.com/modules/news/ LinuxBiometrics.com]

[[User:Wyrfel|Wyrfel]] 01:24, 9 Jan 2006 (CET)
----

==pam_bioapi.so is not linked to libbioapi100.so==
I downloaded the pam_bioapi package and patched the file by following the wiki. However, I got the following result:

~/soft/thinkpad/pam_bioapi-0.2.1/libpam_bioapi/.libs$ ls -la
total 48
drwxr-xr-x 2 louis users 248 2006-01-12 01:18 ./
drwxr-xr-x 4 louis users 312 2006-01-12 01:18 ../
lrwxrwxrwx 1 louis users 16 2006-01-12 01:18 pam_bioapi.la -> ../pam_bioapi.la
-rw-r--r-- 1 louis users 824 2006-01-12 01:18 pam_bioapi.lai
-rw-r--r-- 1 louis users 19716 2006-01-12 01:18 pam_bioapi.o
lrwxrwxrwx 1 louis users 19 2006-01-12 01:18 pam_bioapi.so -> pam_bioapi.so.0.0.0*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 louis users 19 2006-01-12 01:18 pam_bioapi.so.0 -> pam_bioapi.so.0.0.0*
-rwxr-xr-x 1 louis users 21789 2006-01-12 01:18 pam_bioapi.so.0.0.0*

~/soft/thinkpad/pam_bioapi-0.2.1/libpam_bioapi/.libs$ ldd pam_bioapi.so
linux-gate.so.1 => (0xffffe000)
libc.so.6 => /lib/tls/libc.so.6 (0x40025000)
/lib/ld-linux.so.2 (0x80000000)
~/soft/thinkpad/pam_bioapi-0.2.1/libpam_bioapi/.libs$

pam_bioapi.so is NOT linked to libbioapi100.so. The latter is in the ld path:

~/soft/thinkpad/pam_bioapi-0.2.1/libpam_bioapi/.libs$ ldconfig -p |grep bioapi
libtfmessbsp.so (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libtfmessbsp.so
libpwbsp.so.0 (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libpwbsp.so.0
libpwbsp.so (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libpwbsp.so
libmds_util.so.0 (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libmds_util.so.0
libmds_util.so (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libmds_util.so
libbioapi100.so.0 (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libbioapi100.so.0
libbioapi100.so (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libbioapi100.so
libbioapi_mds300.so.0 (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libbioapi_mds300.so.0
libbioapi_mds300.so (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libbioapi_mds300.so
libbioapi_dummy100.so.0 (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libbioapi_dummy100.so.0
libbioapi_dummy100.so (libc6) => /opt/bioapi/lib/libbioapi_dummy100.so

and the Sample program also works allowing me to enroll and test a fingerprint.

My system is SuSE 10 with the kernel of 2.6.13-15. Any ideas?

Thanks.

--[[User:Tyne|Tyne]] 09:51, 12 Jan 2006 (CET)

==xscreensaver 4.23+fingerprint.patch causes xscreensaver-gl to crash kernel==

I've gotten bioapi and 'Sample' to allow me to enroll my fingerprint, and I've also experienced the 'two logon' issue.

I compiled xscreensaver 4.23 (though it seemed that apt came with 4.24) and applied the patch. My goal was to have the fingerprint prompt come up and to see the "bad image" of the fingerprint scan.

The first time I did this, xscreensaver-gl took a dump and was causing kernel crashes. So I went and got the newest xscreensaver source and patches, and applied the bioapi patch to those. It worked (meaning it didnt crash the kernel anymore ;b )

It would seem that there is a /etc/pam.d/xscreensaver, so I commented everything out of that except the bioapi line.

Locking xscreensaver, then attempting to unlock didnt show me any fingerprint requirements, and my password didnt work.

I'm wondering if theres something that was left out of the xscreensaver howto? or if theres anyone out there who's gotten the xscreensaver portion of this to work, who would be willing to help me out :)

--[[User:Viss|Viss]] 11:15am, 5 Feb 2006 (PST)

== gdm hangs on kde logout ==

Hi.

I am using a Thinkpad t43, installed with gentoo.
I run gdm as the login manager, with kde 3.4 and enlightenment dr16 as the window manager.

I followed the steps in the wiki, and the biometric scanner is now working fine, appart from the fact that when I close/end the session I just get a blank screen, in place of the gdm login screen.

Disabling the biometrics (by setting the pam.d file back to their originals), the session ends fine. I do this for a few times, and then set the biometrics back again, and it work fine for a few logouts, and then back to the blank screen again.

I can do ctrl+shift+f1 to get to a console window and from there I can issue a shutdown.
Although this works ok, it is a bit of a pain.

Any ideas ?

== 'gksudo' Doesn't show biopam finger swipe prompt... ==

Hey all,

First off... this is an excellent how-to! I have no real interest in using fingerprint scanner with xscreensaver, but it was up and working with everything else on my system pretty much effortlessly.

I'm running Ubuntu Breezy Badger 5.10 on an IBM T43p (2678) and have run into two oddities:
1) /etc/pam.d/xscreensaver - as it is initially configured, if you have an xscreensaver session set to require password (or xlock with screensaver) then you get prompted for the normal text-password entry and then will be prompted to swipe your finger... This is easily fixed by commenting out the '@include common-auth' line in /etc/pam.d/xscreensaver and adding the line 'auth required pam_unix.so nullok_secure'. After that change it only prompts for the text-password entry challenge.

2) gksudo - This is more of a pain... I can use the fingerprint scanner with gksudo, but gksudo doesn't prompt with the (ugly-but-functional) finger swipe dialog the way that gdm does during login or xscreensaver does when configured as mentioned above (pre-fix). So, if I start a Gnome app launcher that is prepended with gksudo, nothing appears to happen until I swipe my finger and then the app gets launched. That's cool and all, but there are times (esp. when multi-tasking) when I forget to swipe and then go "what happened to xxxxx? oh yeah..."

Anyway... does anyone have an idea of what I can do to get the dialog to appear?

thanx

--[[User:JELaVallee|JELaVallee]] 05:56, 20 February 2006 (CET)

The gksudo problem is a restriction from the X server. It doesn't allow to grab the display for other users than the logged-in one. And the pam_bioapi is invoked as root.

--[[User:Whoopie|Whoopie]] 13:10, 20 February 2006 (CET)

That makes sense... so, now I have to wonder, is there a patchable work-around like the xscreensaver one that could allow for this to work? Where should I research such? gksu's project or is this more an issue at the X11-level?

--[[User:JELaVallee|JELaVallee]] 19:38, 27 February 2006 (CET)

I got it working. Grab out the newer pam-bioapi from CVS (http://savannah.nongnu.org/cvs/?group=pam-bioapi). This version supports "multi-finger" when using the sqlite3 database. And it supports defining the used display.
Change your line in your /etc/pam.d/ files like this:

auth sufficient pam_bioapi.so {5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350} /etc/bioapi/pam/bioshadow.db :0

--[[User:Whoopie|Whoopie]] 14:27, 1 March 2006 (CET)

Very cool... Did you run into any issues rebuilding/installing this? I'll give it a shot this evening... THANKS!

--[[User:JELaVallee|JELaVallee]] 21:07, 1 March 2006 (CET)

Invoke 'xhost +local:' should be able to let gksudo work. Or just blindly sweap the finger. ;)

--[[User:YChao|YChao]] 21:25, 7 March 2006 (CET)

== Multifinger ==

Wow, theres a new version of pam_bioapi which supports multifinger enrollment and user identification.
I'll break my system with that this evening :)

Yes, but I'm searching the patch for xdm. The download page from Josef Hajas (http://nax.hn.org/pub/bioapi/) is down. Does anybody have it?

Update: The patch can be found here: http://www.qrivy.net/~michael/blua/xdm_bio.patch

--[[User:Whoopie|Whoopie]] 17:43, 1 March 2006 (CET)

Tried the newest pam-bioapi from CVS (http://savannah.nongnu.org/cvs/?group=pam-bioapi) on FC3. Failed on enrolling fingerprints: ({{path|/var/log/secure|}})

<code>Mar 9 15:30:40 localhost pam_bioapi[32407]: Can't open database: library routine called out of
sequence</code>

Could anyone help?

--[[User:Ychao|Ychao]] 00:38, 10 March 2006 (CET)

I don't know how to solve it. It seems to be a problem with sqlite3. Which version do you use? Under Ubuntu Breezy, it's 3.2.1.

--[[User:Whoopie|Whoopie]] 12:27, 10 March 2006 (CET)

Did anybody tried multifinger with BioAPI? I am interested in multifinger at all, not only PAM.

Updated:

succesfully installed pam_bioapi with multifinger support, some info:

use: <code>auth sufficient pam_bioapi.so {5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350} /etc/bioapi/pam/bioshadow.db :0</code> in pam.d, the bioshadow column is path to bioapi sqlite database.

if authentication doesn't work, edit /etc/syslog.conf and write line *.alert /var/log/syslog, so you see pam_bioapi messages in /var/log/syslog
most common error is missing biodata table, newest pam_bioapi version should create it automatically, but if it doesn't, go to /etc/bioapi/pam/ and run command <code>sqlite3 bioshadow.db</code>, then insert this:

<code>CREATE TABLE biodata (id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY,uid INTEGER,uuid TEXT,header BLOB,data BLOB,signature BLOB,type INTEGER,other BLOB);</code>

you must then enroll at least one fingerprint to the database, do it using test_enroll-pam_bioapi from pam_bioapi distribution. note that you must have root user enrolled in order to use <code>su</code> command.

--[[User:MeBa|MeBa]] 16:58, 22 March 2006 (CET)

== GNOME Screensaver support ==

Did anybody try to port the xscreensaver patch to gnome-screensaver? Since Ubuntu Dapper will be shiped with it, it would be nice to have it working then with the fingerprint reader.

Update: Initial support can be found in gnome-screensaver CVS. See [http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=338635 bugreport].

--[[User:Whoopie|Whoopie]] 12:36, 16 March 2006 (CET)

== No sources for bioapi 1.2.3 ==

There doesn't seem to be any sources available for the recommended Debian package bioapi-1.2.3. That's rather distressing since this is security-related software. A google search doesn't seem to be turning up anything, either. Anybody have a lead on where to find sources?

--[[User:TedTso|TedTso]] 7:47, 29 Apri 2006 (EDT)

== Strange issue on GDM login ==

I successfully have the fingerprint reader running. Everything is working nicely, except when I try to login with GDM for the first time. The login seems to work fine (the PAM_BIOAPI seems to return true) but GDM hangs then. This issue does not occur when I already logged in using password and logged out again or if I kill GDM when it hangs after the first attempt. Anyone an idea on this?

--[[User:Dotxp|dotxp]] 22:54, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

== Don't ask for finger scan when lid closed ==

When using an external CRT+keyboard+mouse with the LD lid closed, it's quiet annoying to have to reach over and open the lid in order to do a finger scan.
Any idea how to make PAM use the fingerprint reader when the lid is open, but skip it when the lid is closed?

--[[User:Thinker|Thinker]] 13:30, 7 May 2006 (CEST)

I edited my /etc/gdm/Init/Default script in a way, that it changes /etc/pam.d/common-auth depending on the lid state: When the lid is closed, the file is replaced by a version without the lines for the finterprint reader, and of course the opposite action when the lid is open.

--[[User:Aerials|Aerials]] 15:52, 9 July 2006 (CEST)
----

== Unable to initialize Bioapi framework, BioAPI error #:3 ==

I see some other discussion on this page about the dreaded "Unable to initialize Bioapi framework, BioAPI error #:3" error, but the only solution i can see seems really complicated -- adding users to groups when they log in, etc. Is that really the simplest way to make xscreensaver work? I'm the only user of my laptop -- the only account who will ever log in, the only fingerprint in the database, the only person who will ever run xscreensaver. Is there some quick easy way to make xscreensaver unlock when i swipe my finger?

-- [[User:Mike Schiraldi|Mike Schiraldi]] 19:52, 16 May 2006 (CEST)

== Security level ==

[http://www.upek.com/support/pdf/BioAPI_PerfectMatchBSP1.7.pdf UPEK PerfectMatch Algorithm]
According to this link, highest security level is 0 which is opposite to 5 mentioned in the article. What is correct?

Update: Well,TFMESS_BSP_LIN.pdf, i downloaded somewhere stated 5 as highest security level. So, ?