Red Hat Bugzilla – Bug 163813
fstab-sync fails with "error: libhal_ctx_init_direct: (null): (null)"
Last modified: 2013-03-13 00:48:43 EDT
Description of problem: error: libhal_ctx_init_direct: (null): (null) Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): 0.5.3-2 How reproducible: run "fstab-sync" in root shell Actual results: error message as shown fails to detect cdrom, no entry added to /etc/fstab Expected results: will create /dev/cdrom entry in /etc/fstab Additional info: I appear to have no /dev/cdrom but the drive is there. Manually creating a symlink cdrom -> hdc in /dev allows other programs to work correctly, but ...
I can confirm this too.
It sometimes works. I'm still having trouble with xcdroast, I'll 'zilla that separately later.
Actually, the plot thickens: it is now working at boot time (adding cdwriter -> hdc) since I removed "alias radeonfb off" from /etc/modprobe.conf I wouldn't know where to file this one ... Still fails with that error message if I run "fstab-sync" from a console.
It worked at boot time for me too. It does have the correct fstab entry. However, no logical link.....logical link is done by udev, I believe!
I'm having the same problem with fstab-sync bailing out: bash$ /usr/sbin/fstab-sync error: libhal_ctx_init_direct: (null): (null) As a consequence I can't mount my portable MP3-player, even though it shows up in Nautilus under "Computer", and the device _is_ created at /dev/sda. bash$ rpm -q hal hal-0.5.4-3
Confirm this on a machine running Arch Linux (http://www.archlinux.org) with newest hal and dbus.
It looks like there is a "fix" for this in hal CVS by changing the category of audio players back to storage instead of portable_audio_player. That doesn't quite seem entirely like the right fix, though. 2005-08-31 Danny Kukawka <danny.kukawka@web.de> * fdi/information/10freedesktop/10-usb-music-players.fdi: Removed merge of not useful key info.category=portable_audio_player. This merge breakes the storage policy and prevent mount of USB storage players. See bug: https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=113966
It isn't the right fix per say. David says category is broken and shouldn't be used by programs. The fix is to have fstab-sync look at info.capabilities. I will look into fixing this in fstab-sync
I don't suppose this is related: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=171296 (mount points, etc. not created for lvm vol-group on USB drive)?
Nope bug 171296 looks like it deals with a /dev/ device node not being created. That would be a udev issue.
Ok this isn't right. I looked through the code and it is looking at capabilities correctly. The problem looks deeper. The error - libhal_ctx_init_direct: (null): (null) is a red herring when running from fstab-sync from the console. fstab-sync needs to run from a hal callout so it can get a direct connection to HAL (hal does this to avoid spamming the bus). The biggest problem there is the code errors out without setting an error hense the (null): (null) which upstream should deal with. Anyway, I think this is a udev problem. Can you attach the contents of lshal and fstab when the cdrom does not work? Also a better discription of what goes wrong. Thanks.
Works for me with today's rawhide: Inserting iPod mini now results in /media/ipod being created and mounted.
Yep, J5 fixed it