HAL is undergoing deprecation at the moment. All major distributions push for the removal of HAL in favor of DeviceKit-disks/udisk, DeviceKit-power/upower and udev.

thunar-volman uses HAL for distinguishing different device types like portable audio players, removable media, cameras, printers etc.

In order to port thunar-volman to udev and GIO, we need to collect information about how device types can be distinguished via udev. Mounting removable media should be a no-brainer if we use GVolumeMonitor and GIO.

Some portable music players can be identified using the following udev properties:

Others have to be mounted like mass storage devices first. Afterwards, an investigation of their file system is necessary. Here's a list of special music folders of certain devices:

Note: this folder is typically present on an iPod even if it is reflashed with Rockbox. The difference between the original and reflashed iPods is that the original iPod needs special directory hierarchy and a special database file maintained by libgpod, and Rockbox plays anything from any directory without the need to install special programs. Rockbox can be detected by the presence of the .rockbox folder.

Some cameras can be identified by special gphoto2 and probably PTP properties:

Cameras not supporting this are usually represented as mass storage devices. Our only chance to distinguish them from normal mass storage devices is via special folders like:

• DCIM
• dcim
• iPod_Control/Photos
• …?

or (Volito 2, Bamboo)

Bold means: implemented in the new thunar-volman version based on udev/GIO.

1. Filtering based on capabilities:
   1. block
   2. camera
   3. input.keyboard (run command)
   4. input.mouse (run command)
   5. input.tablet (run command)
   6. pda
   7. printer (run command)
2. Block devices:
   1. CD-ROM:
      1. blank disc (run burn software command)
      2. mixed audio/data discs (play or continue with mounting)
      3. audio discs (play)
      4. data discs (continue with mounting)
   2. crypto volumes
   3. normal volumes (continue with mounting)
   4. mounting:
      1. iPods (either open music or import photos)
      2. digital photo camera with mass storage (run command)
      3. video CDs/DVDs (run command)
      4. media with .autorun, autorun, autorun.sh (autorun)
      5. media with autorun.exe (via wine) (autorun)
      6. media with .autoopen or autoopen (autorun)
      7. browse media (open thunar)
3. Camera devices:
   1. ptp or gphoto2 cameras (run command)
4. PDA devices:
   1. palm (run command)
   2. pocketpc (run command)

UDEV_LOG=3
DEVPATH=/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1f.1/host3/target3:0:0/3:0:0:0/block/sr0
MAJOR=11
MINOR=0
DEVNAME=/dev/sr0
DEVTYPE=disk
ID_CDROM=1
ID_CDROM_CD_R=1
ID_CDROM_CD_RW=1
ID_CDROM_DVD=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_R=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_RW=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_RAM=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_PLUS_R=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_PLUS_RW=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_PLUS_R_DL=1
ID_CDROM_MRW=1
ID_CDROM_MRW_W=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_DVD_PLUS_R=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_STATE=blank
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_SESSION_NEXT=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_SESSION_COUNT=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_TRACK_COUNT=1
ID_VENDOR=Optiarc
ID_VENDOR_ENC=Optiarc\x20
ID_MODEL=DVD_RW_AD-7910A
ID_MODEL_ENC=DVD\x20RW\x20AD-7910A\x20
ID_REVISION=1.D1
ID_TYPE=cd
ID_BUS=scsi
ID_PATH=pci-0000:00:1f.1-scsi-0:0:0:0
ACL_MANAGE=1
GENERATED=1
DKD_PRESENTATION_NOPOLICY=0
DKD_MEDIA_AVAILABLE=1
DEVLINKS=/dev/block/11:0 /dev/scd0 /dev/disk/by-path/pci-0000:00:1f.1-scsi-0:0:0:0 /dev/cdrom /dev/cdrw /dev/dvd /dev/dvdrw

UDEV_LOG=3
DEVPATH=/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1f.1/host3/target3:0:0/3:0:0:0/block/sr0
MAJOR=11
MINOR=0
DEVNAME=/dev/sr0
DEVTYPE=disk
ID_CDROM=1
ID_CDROM_CD_R=1
ID_CDROM_CD_RW=1
ID_CDROM_DVD=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_R=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_RW=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_RAM=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_PLUS_R=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_PLUS_RW=1
ID_CDROM_DVD_PLUS_R_DL=1
ID_CDROM_MRW=1
ID_CDROM_MRW_W=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_CD_R=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_STATE=blank
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_SESSION_NEXT=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_SESSION_COUNT=1
ID_CDROM_MEDIA_TRACK_COUNT=1
ID_VENDOR=Optiarc
ID_VENDOR_ENC=Optiarc\x20
ID_MODEL=DVD_RW_AD-7910A
ID_MODEL_ENC=DVD\x20RW\x20AD-7910A\x20
ID_REVISION=1.D1
ID_TYPE=cd
ID_BUS=scsi
ID_PATH=pci-0000:00:1f.1-scsi-0:0:0:0
ACL_MANAGE=1
GENERATED=1
DKD_PRESENTATION_NOPOLICY=0
DKD_MEDIA_AVAILABLE=1
DEVLINKS=/dev/block/11:0 /dev/scd0 /dev/disk/by-path/pci-0000:00:1f.1-scsi-0:0:0:0 /dev/cdrom /dev/cdrw /dev/dvd /dev/dvdrw

• 2010-07-19:
  • Basic code design and skeleton for detecting devices
  • Mount volumes, partitions and data CDs/DVDs and open them in Thunar
  • Play video CDs/DVDs automatically
• 2010-07-20:
  • Detect blank CDs/DVDs and open the favorite burn software
  • Autorun support (native and autorun.exe in wine)
  • Autoopen support
  • Detect photo content on mass storage cameras and open the favorite photo manager
  • Detect media (audio) players and iPods, launch photo or music manager
  • Detect input devices (keyboard, mouse, tablet) and run a command
• 2010-07-21:
  • Detect additional wacom tablets (volito, bamboo)
  • Detect printers and run a command
  • Detect gphoto2 cameras (most of which don't have a mass storage mode) and run the photos manager
  • Detect audio and mixed audio/data CDs, ask user what to do, either mount or play the audio CD
  • Verified that encrypted volumes are detected and mounted properly
  • Port the entire settings dialog to the new codebase
• 2010-07-22:
  • Display notifications when devices are mounted or detected (optional; requires libnotify)
• 2010-07-23:
  • Thunar: re-implement unmount/eject notifications based on libnotify (optional)
  • Bugfixing
• 2010-07-24:
  • Bugfixing
• 2010-07-25:
  • Released Thunar 1.1.1 and thunar-volman 0.5.0 with full support for udev and GIO and no dependency on HAL.
• 2010-07-26:
  • Released thunar-volman 0.5.1 as a quick follow-up release to fix a critical bug.