What triggers suspend on ibook?

[Yannick Patois]

Hi,

SUMMARY: When I close the lid of my ibook on battery, a few minuts after
it crash (I think it attmpts to suspend); how can this be avoided?

DEVELOPPMENT:
On my ibook G4 suspend (disk or RAM) is not yet supported by the
standard linux kernel. I'm aware that a few patches are floating around
that are supposed to allow this, but I prefers to stick to regular
kernel as much as possible and avoid long useless failed tests (I tried
some disk sleep patch some time ago that didnt gave me anything).

Moreover, I dont really need sleep, as it is very likely to come accross
a power plug in less than 5 hours...

Unfortunately, when I close the lid on battery, a few minuts after it is
crashed. I suppose there is some failed attempts to sleep somehow. There
is nothing in the log files and the computer has to be cold-booted.

What can cause this (likely) suspend order? Can this be configured
somewhere? I installed powerprefs and use pbbuttonsd, I suppressed the
sleep mode from /etc/pbbuttonsd.conf completly, but my computer still
crash the same way if I close the lid on battery.

Any help welcome, thanks.

Yannick

Note: The (i belive) relevant part of the /etc/pbbuttonsd.conf file:

onBattery_policy = powersave ; 'nochange', 'powersave',
onBattery_TimerAction = blankscreen ; 'none', 'suspend-to-ram',
onBattery_CoverAction = blankscreen ; see TimerAction for possible
onBattery_KeyAction = blankscreen ; Action (see TimerAction) for
onBattery_SuspendTime = 0
onBattery_DimTime = 600

[Jack Malmostoso]

Post by Yannick Patois
SUMMARY: When I close the lid of my ibook on battery, a few minuts after
it crash (I think it attmpts to suspend); how can this be avoided?

First, a suggestion: start following the Debian PowerPC mailing list
(it's low traffic, and if you don't want to subscribe it you can read it
through the newserver gateway at linux.debian.ports.powerpc), as much of
the development happens there.

Then: suspend is actually supported by the kernel, starting from 2.6.11!
BenH wrote a patch against 2.6.9 that has been tested and I currently can
sleep my iBook at will, and resuming it without problems.
Only glitch, so far, is that upon resume USB ports look without power, but
usually another sleep/wake cycle is enough to put back everything in
place. I am waiting for 2.6.12 (which should be next "stable" release,
opposite to "development" 2.6.11.x) to see if the people of linux-usb can
work this out.

My summary then looks like this: grab a 2.6.11.x tarball from kernel.org
and compile your own kernel. If you don't know how to do it, please
specify your distro and I will be glad to help.

Bye!

[Yannick Patois]

Hi,

Post by Jack Malmostoso

Post by Yannick Patois
SUMMARY: When I close the lid of my ibook on battery, a few minuts after
it crash (I think it attmpts to suspend); how can this be avoided?

First, a suggestion: start following the Debian PowerPC mailing list
(it's low traffic, and if you don't want to subscribe it you can read it
through the newserver gateway at linux.debian.ports.powerpc), as much of
the development happens there.

OK, thanks.

Post by Jack Malmostoso
Then: suspend is actually supported by the kernel, starting from 2.6.11!
BenH wrote a patch against 2.6.9 that has been tested and I currently can
sleep my iBook at will, and resuming it without problems.

Great!

Post by Jack Malmostoso
My summary then looks like this: grab a 2.6.11.x tarball from kernel.org
and compile your own kernel. If you don't know how to do it, please
specify your distro and I will be glad to help.

I'm running debian unstable. I know how to recompile a kernel the debian
way, but I guess that there are not yet any debianized 2.6.11, so I
would have to do it otherwise. I ran BenH kernels a few years ago with
my (now stollen) ibook G3, so I certainly can do that if needed.

But I really prefer to stay with a debian kernel, from which I get
upgrade to latest versions with a simple apt-get, and I'm reluctant to
spend to much time recompiling a 2.6.11 for unsure results (will I
really dont break anything that I currently have, like crypted
partitions and such?), while simply waiting a few (month?) will get the
2.6.11 in debian unstable...

So if there was a very simple way to prevent my ibook to attempt
sleeping in the meantime I would do that. If that proved to be as much
complex as installing 2.6.11 I would think twice, of course.

Thanks again for your answer.

Yannick

[Jack Malmostoso]

Post by Yannick Patois
But I really prefer to stay with a debian kernel

2.6.11 sources entered a week ago in apt-get, and some test releases were
announced last week, so it shouldn't take long.

Post by Yannick Patois
So if there was a very simple way to prevent my ibook to attempt
sleeping in the meantime I would do that. If that proved to be as much
complex as installing 2.6.11 I would think twice, of course.

For that you have to configure properly pbbuttonsd: it's that that manages
the power.

[Yannick Patois]

Hi,

Post by Jack Malmostoso

Post by Yannick Patois
But I really prefer to stay with a debian kernel

2.6.11 sources entered a week ago in apt-get, and some test releases were
announced last week, so it shouldn't take long.

Thanks for this useful piece of information, then I'll wait.

Post by Jack Malmostoso

Post by Yannick Patois
So if there was a very simple way to prevent my ibook to attempt
sleeping in the meantime I would do that. If that proved to be as much
complex as installing 2.6.11 I would think twice, of course.

For that you have to configure properly pbbuttonsd: it's that that manages
the power.

As you seen in my first message on this thread, I put in
/etc/pbbuttonsd.conf what I think is correct for this. But my ibook is
still crashing a few minuts after a lid close on battery.

Any suggestion?

Thanks again for your help.

Yannick

[sam tygier]

Post by Yannick Patois
So if there was a very simple way to prevent my ibook to attempt
sleeping in the meantime I would do that.

its probably not possible. a lot of heat get disapated through the key board, and closing the lid is likely to cause overheating if the ibook is stiff running. if you could find some hack then you would be risking the machine, unless there is an overheat mechanism in there which will kill the power anyway.


sam tygier
http://www.tygier.co.uk/