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Bluetooth is a standard for the short-range wireless interconnection of cellular phones, computers, and other electronic devices. In Linux, the canonical implementation of the Bluetooth protocol stack is BlueZ.
Install the Bluetooth protocol stack bluez and the bluez-utils package which provides the bluetoothctl
utility from the official repositories. The dbus
daemon, which is started automatically by systemd, is used to read settings and for PIN pairing, while the bluetooth
daemon is required for the Bluetooth protocol.
Load the generic bluetooth driver, if not already loaded:
# modprobe btusb
Then start the bluetooth
service. You can enable it to start automatically at boot time.
Pairing a device from the shell is one of the simplest and most reliable options. The exact procedure depends on the devices involved and their input functionality. What follows is a general outline of pairing a device using /usr/bin/bluetoothctl
:
Start the bluetoothctl
interactive command. There one can input help
to get a list of available commands.
power on
. It is off by default.devices
to get the MAC Address of the device with which to pair.scan on
command if device is not yet on the list.agent on
.pair MAC Address
to do the pairing (tab completion works).trust MAC Address
to do so.connect MAC_address
to establish a connection.An example session may look this way:
# bluetoothctl [NEW] Controller 00:10:20:30:40:50 pi [default] [bluetooth]# agent KeyboardOnly Agent registered [bluetooth]# default-agent Default agent request successful [bluetooth]# scan on Discovery started [CHG] Controller 00:10:20:30:40:50 Discovering: yes [NEW] Device 00:12:34:56:78:90 myLino [CHG] Device 00:12:34:56:78:90 LegacyPairing: yes [bluetooth]# pair 00:12:34:56:78:90 Attempting to pair with 00:12:34:56:78:90 [CHG] Device 00:12:34:56:78:90 Connected: yes [CHG] Device 00:12:34:56:78:90 Connected: no [CHG] Device 00:12:34:56:78:90 Connected: yes Request PIN code [agent] Enter PIN code: 1234 [CHG] Device 00:12:34:56:78:90 Paired: yes Pairing successful [CHG] Device 00:12:34:56:78:90 Connected: no
In order to have the device active after a reboot, a udev rule is needed:
/etc/udev/rules.d/10-local.rules
# Set bluetooth power up ACTION=="add", KERNEL=="hci0", RUN+="/usr/bin/hciconfig hci0 up"
After a suspend/resume-cycle, the device can be powered on automatically using something like this systemd service:
/etc/systemd/system/[email protected]
[Unit] Description=Bluetooth auto power on After=bluetooth.service sys-subsystem-bluetooth-devices-%i.device suspend.target [Service] Type=oneshot #We could also do a 200 char long call to bluez via dbus. Except this does not work since bluez does not react to dbus at this point of the resume sequence and I do not know how I get this service to run at a time it does. So we just ignore bluez and force %i up using hciconfig. Welcome to the 21st century. #ExecStart=/usr/bin/dbus-send --system --type=method_call --dest=org.bluez /org/bluez/%I org.freedesktop.DBus.Properties.Set string:org.bluez.Adapter1 string:Powered variant:boolean:true ExecStart=/usr/bin/hciconfig %i up [Install] WantedBy=suspend.target
The following packages allow for a graphical interface to customize Bluetooth.
GNOME Bluetooth is a fork of the old bluez-gnome and is focused on integration with the GNOME desktop environment. The gnome-bluetooth package provides the back-end, gnome-shellprovides the status monitor applet, and gnome-control-center provides the configuration front-end GUI that can be accessed by typing Bluetooth on the Activities overview, or with the gnome-control-center bluetooth
command.
You can also launch the following commands directly:
bluetooth-sendto
: send files to a remote devicebluetooth-wizard
: for new devices to be pairedTo add a Bluetooth entry to the SendTo menu in Thunar's file properties menu, see instructions here. (The command that needs to be configured is bluetooth-sendto %F
).
To receive files, you must install the obexfs and gnome-user-share packages. You can then go to Settings->Sharing to authorize receiving files from paired devices over bluetooth.
The Bluetooth tool for KDE is BlueDevil. It can be installed with the package bluedevil4 (KDE4) or bluedevil (KDE Plasma 5), available in the official repositories.
Make sure bluetooth
daemon is running, as described above. A Bluetooth icon should be visible in both Dolphin and in the system tray (though following an update from plasma-desktop 5.2 to 5.3 you may need to add the symbol/widget manually), from which users may configure BlueDevil and detect Bluetooth devices by clicking the icon. An interface is also available from the KDE System Settings.
See Blueman.
Another option, rather than using KDE or Gnome Bluetooth packages, is ObexFS which allows for the mounting of phones which are treated like any other filesystem.
Install obexfs and mount supported phones by running:
$ obexfs -b MAC_address_of_device /mountpoint
Once you have finished, to unmount the device use the command:
$ fusermount -u /mountpoint
For more mounting options see http://dev.zuckschwerdt.org/openobex/wiki/ObexFs
If your device supports the Obex FTP service but you do not wish to mount the device you can transfer files to and from the device using the obexftp command.
To send a file to a device run the command:
$ obexftp -b MAC_address_of_device -p /path/to/file
To retrieve a file from a device run the command:
$ obexftp -b MAC_address_of_device -g filename
For devices that do not support Obex FTP service, check if Obex Object Push is supported.
# sdptool browse XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
Read the output, look for Obex Object Push, remember the channel for this service. If supported, one can use ussp-push to send files to this device:
# ussp-push XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX@CHANNEL file wanted_file_name_on_phone
All examples have been moved to the bluez4 article. They need to be checked and fixed for use with bluez5.
If bluetoothctl cannot find any controller, the bluetooth device may be blocked. Try to unblock it using rfkill:
# rfkill unblock bluetooth
If you see this when trying to enable receiving files in bluetooth-properties:
Bluetooth OBEX start failed: Invalid path Bluetooth FTP start failed: Invalid path
Then install xdg-user-dirs and issue:
$ xdg-user-dirs-update
You can edit the paths using:
$ vi ~/.config/user-dirs.dirs
If you are using a USB dongle, you should check that your Bluetooth dongle is recognized. You can do that by running journalctl -f
when you have plugged in the USB dongle (or inspecting /var/log/messages.log
). It should look something like the following (look out for hci):
Feb 20 15:00:24 hostname kernel: [ 2661.349823] usb 4-1: new full-speed USB device number 3 using uhci_hcd Feb 20 15:00:24 hostname bluetoothd[4568]: HCI dev 0 registered Feb 20 15:00:24 hostname bluetoothd[4568]: Listening for HCI events on hci0 Feb 20 15:00:25 hostname bluetoothd[4568]: HCI dev 0 up Feb 20 15:00:25 hostname bluetoothd[4568]: Adapter /org/bluez/4568/hci0 has been enabled
If you only get the first two lines, you may see that it found the device but you need to bring it up. Example:
hciconfig -a hci0
hci0: Type: USB BD Address: 00:00:00:00:00:00 ACL MTU: 0:0 SCO MTU: 0:0 DOWN RX bytes:0 acl:0 sco:0 events:0 errors:0 TX bytes:0 acl:0 sco:0 commands:0 errors:
# hciconfig hci0 up
hciconfig -a hci0
hci0: Type: USB BD Address: 00:02:72:C4:7C:06 ACL MTU: 377:10 SCO MTU: 64:8 UP RUNNING RX bytes:348 acl:0 sco:0 events:11 errors:0 TX bytes:38 acl:0 sco:0 commands:11 errors:0
If this fails with an error like:
Operation not possible due to RF-kill
it could be due either to the rfkill
utility, in which case it should be resolved with
# rfkill unblock all
or, it could simply be the hardware switch of the computer. The hardware bluetooth switch (at least sometimes) controls access to USB bluetooth dongles also. Flip/press this switch and try bringing the device up again.
To verify that the device was detected you can use hcitool
which is part of the bluez-utils
. You can get a list of available devices and their identifiers and their MAC address by issuing:
$ hcitool dev
Devices: hci0 00:1B:DC:0F:DB:40
More detailed information about the device can be retrieved by using hciconfig
.
$ hciconfig -a hci0
hci0: Type: USB BD Address: 00:1B:DC:0F:DB:40 ACL MTU: 310:10 SCO MTU: 64:8 UP RUNNING PSCAN ISCAN RX bytes:1226 acl:0 sco:0 events:27 errors:0 TX bytes:351 acl:0 sco:0 commands:26 errors:0 Features: 0xff 0xff 0x8f 0xfe 0x9b 0xf9 0x00 0x80 Packet type: DM1 DM3 DM5 DH1 DH3 DH5 HV1 HV2 HV3 Link policy: RSWITCH HOLD SNIFF PARK Link mode: SLAVE ACCEPT Name: 'BlueZ (0)' Class: 0x000100 Service Classes: Unspecified Device Class: Computer, Uncategorized HCI Ver: 2.0 (0x3) HCI Rev: 0xc5c LMP Ver: 2.0 (0x3) LMP Subver: 0xc5c Manufacturer: Cambridge Silicon Radio (10)
There are Logitech dongles (ex. Logitech MX5000) that can work in two modes Embedded and HCI. In embedded mode dongle emulates a USB device so it seems to your PC that you are using a normal USB mouse/keyoard.
If you hold the little red Button on the USB BT mini-receiver it will enable the other mode. Hold the red button on the BT dongle and plug it into the computer, and after 3-5 seconds of holding the button, the Bluetooth icon will appear in the system tray. Discussion
Alternatively, you can install the bluez-hid2hci package. When you connect your Logitech dongle it will automatically switch.
# /usr/lib/udev/hid2hci
# hciconfig hci0 up
If your device still soft blocked and you run connman, try this:
$ connmanctl enable bluetooth
Cannot discover computer from your phone? Enable PSCAN and ISCAN:
# enable PSCAN and ISCAN $ hciconfig hci0 piscan # check it worked
$ hciconfig
hci0: Type: USB BD Address: 00:12:34:56:78:9A ACL MTU: 192:8 SCO MTU: 64:8 UP RUNNING PSCAN ISCAN RX bytes:20425 acl:115 sco:0 events:526 errors:0 TX bytes:5543 acl:84 sco:0 commands:340 errors:0
Try changing device class in /etc/bluetooth/main.conf
as following:
# Default device class. Only the major and minor device class bits are # considered. #Class = 0x000100 (from default config) Class = 0x100100
This was the only solution to make my computer visible for my phone.
If you do not get the passkey when you try to pair your Logitech keyboard, type the following command:
# hciconfig hci0 sspmode 0
If after pairing, the keyboard still does not connect, check the output of hcidump -at
. If the latter indicates repeatedly connections-disconnections like the following message:
status 0x00 handle 11 reason 0x13 Reason: Remote User Terminated Connection
then, the only solution for now is to install the old Bluetooth stack.
bluez5 removed support for the HSP/HFP profiles (telephony headset for TeamSpeak, Skype, etc.). You need to install Pulseaudio (>= version 6) or another application that implements HSP/HFP itself.
If you are experiencing that your Thinkpad Bluetooth Laser Mouse rapidly connects and then (after a few milliseconds) disconnects again every few seconds (when you move the mouse or press a button), try pairing it with the code 0000
instead pairing without a code.