Linux Compatibility with the Z10

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02-20-13, 05:23 AM
MattyVendetta

Linux Compatibility with the Z10

Hi guys,
Haven't posted here in a loooong time, well since i had the Bold 9000 anyway
Had my Z10 for about 24 hours now and i'm loving it so far, set up was a bit of a pain to begin with (more due to to my own fault I think) but apart from that its a great bit of kit!
My main concern is that I cant seem to connect to my pc to transfer files, I have plugged the phone in and I get the message on the screen saying its going to install BB link but it only mentions Windows and Mac, not Linux...
Has anybody managed to sync with Linux? I'm running the latest Ubuntu and am a bit lost now thinking that im not going to be able to transfer my files over.... I would like to transfer my music and videos but is it going to be a real pain? The only thing I can come up with is loading it all bit by bit onto my 2gb sd card and transferring that way which I REALLY don't want to do!
Cheers for any resposes
02-20-13, 05:56 AM
raremage

You might get around it by enabling USB mass storage mode. Look in settings, storage and access. Scroll to the bottom.
02-20-13, 06:09 AM
BlackQtCoder

Originally Posted by raremage

You might get around it by enabling USB mass storage mode. Look in settings, storage and access. Scroll to the bottom.

Right, you must set it with Mac support
03-11-13, 07:35 AM
ReddoC

Hello,

I try to connect my bb z10 to ubuntu using usb.

I cannot found the option for mass storage.

And if I try to set USB connection to Mac and connect the usb, Ubuntu detect bb 10 as a new network wire connection.

Help ?
03-11-13, 08:13 AM
bbrog

2 Attachment(s)

OK couple of points
Attachment 140463
You can always set up wifi in same location.
I connected to my net book and toggled settings. Got the network connection a few times, but just toggled between auto and Mac. When it stopped showing network I ran dmesg.

Attachment 140465
Then created a mount point (sudo mkdir blackberry) , then mounted the device. Mount /dev/sr0 blackberry

Posted via CB10
03-11-13, 08:14 AM
bbrog

Second pic too big or one pic per message?

Posted via CB10
03-11-13, 08:19 AM
bbrog

Sorry for the spamming. That only seems to get you as far as windows device drivers.

Posted via CB10
03-11-13, 08:51 AM
DetlevCM

Just a pointer : the Z10 will show as a network drive, not normal removable media.

I would say if you switch to mass storage mode and leave it on automatic it should show up, however I am more a Windows user who has to sometimes use Linux.

Posted via CB10
03-18-13, 09:33 AM
advil_yum

I thought I would mention what I did last night to get my Z10 connected to Linux... well, not really in the same manor as what you're trying, but it was a solution that worked for me. PS: I'm using Mageia 2 x86 and my Z10 does NOT have an SD card in it. I believe Mass Storage only works when you have a memory card in, but I don't have one to test currently. BlackBerry no longer allows access to built-in memory directly through mass storage. Must be for security reasons and it's very annoying. Once again Linux users are left to defend for themselves. :nerd:

I was about to head out for a walk with the dog and wanted to load up some music, so plugged it in and nothing happened. I tried to mount it similar to what this thread mentions and how you do it on the Playbook, but that didn't work either. It mounted fine, but did not show any of the file system.
Getting very frustrated at this point.
My solution after spending 30 minutes trying to connect it, all the while my the dog looking intensely at me was to try and pull files via FTP.
In my case, all of my music resides on a cheap DLink NAS. This would work on local storage as well, but you'll have to install an FTP server of your choice on your computer. I tried connecting to the FTP server through the BlackBerry browser (thought that would be quickest/easiest), but it didn't like that for some reason. The browser didn't interpret the FTP directories as links - that could be the FTP server's fault. So I downloaded another browser "Simple Browser" to try but that also didn't work.
So Next I tried some FTP clients, first Ghost Commander. It's an awesome Android app that includes a lot of ways to manage files including via FTP. It connected fine and I was able to download music and listen to the music, but I found the FTP-connected interface a little cumbersome (albeit, I didn't spend much time with it) so tried another. Next I tried RsFTP Client (AndFTP) - obviously another Android port, but the interface was simple and worked flawlessly. It lets you flip between local and FTP directories all the while keeping previously selected items selected. I could easily select multiple files or folders and the transfer happened quickly. Much quicker than Samba of CIFS it seemed. RsFTP did disconnect on me a few times while I was selecting folders to pull, but I think that possibly my FTP server was timing out on me. I think I have it set to 2 minutes.

Anyway, this long drawn out post can be boiled down to one sentence. Install and FTP client on your computer or NAS then connect to that server with some very simple and free FTP clients on your Z10 - I recommend RsFTP currently. There were a few other free ones in BlackBerry world that I didn't try either because the description was poor or there were no reviews.
Sure it may not be as seamless as a mounted drive and you have to manage files from your Z10 instead of the computer, but it works really well and I think easier than constantly having to mount a drive.

The other option would be install an FTP client on your Z10 and connect to it from your computer. I didn't try this method yet, but might be a really good choice too. It would be easier to manage files than by doing so from your handheld (I found 1 on BlackBerry World called "FTP Server" which was a Playbook app converted for Z10 as the description hasn't changed. I haven't tried it). You could also reserve an IP for your Z10 on your router so that it never changes to make it easier to connect to in the future.

Anyway, I hope this helps someone out. I'll be using this method from here on out and won't ever be mounting the Z10 on Linux again. It's not needed!
03-18-13, 12:02 PM
nah.uhh

You have to turn wifi sharing on, set the password, make note of the username. Leave it on.

Then plug your device in, open nautilus(ubuntu file manager), menu connect to server or type in the location bar
smb://yourdevicename

And storage should be set to connect to windows. Mac gives issues sometimes

You don't need to create any mountpoints..
Just save the Pw when connecting, and then bookmark the location.
03-31-13, 11:56 AM
FishTire

Ubuntu => Z10 Internal Storage Access

Tutorial with Pics.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...44442042,d.dmQ
03-31-13, 12:33 PM
nah.uhh

Working link

http://community.koodomobile.com/koo...ile_management
04-06-13, 02:38 PM
ingeniumed

Originally Posted by nah.uhh

Working link

BlackBerry Z10 On Ubuntu (File Management)

Fantastic tutorial! Guys use this one for sure!
05-02-13, 02:47 PM
geekwu

With wifi sharing on you don't need to plug the Z10 in (unless it's just for power). Just use the Z10's wifi IP address.

There are two shares on the Z10: \\my-z10\media and \\my-z10\removable_sdcard. The former is for the Z10's internal storage while the latter is, obviously, for the sd card. (Unfortunately, I forgot where I dug this up from so can't give proper credit. Sorry.) I created a bash script to automatically mount these two shares (with mount.cifs) whenever I run it.

Originally Posted by nah.uhh

You have to turn wifi sharing on, set the password, make note of the username. Leave it on.

Then plug your device in, open nautilus(ubuntu file manager), menu connect to server or type in the location bar
smb://yourdevicename

And storage should be set to connect to windows. Mac gives issues sometimes

You don't need to create any mountpoints..
Just save the Pw when connecting, and then bookmark the location.
05-06-13, 12:00 AM
nah.uhh

Originally Posted by geekwu

With wifi sharing on you don't need to plug the Z10 in (unless it's just for power).

..no. But you do have to have 'access using wifi' enabled in order to access the shares using usb on Linux..
no its not just for power, what I posted was the only method (that I'm aware of, could be wrong) to gain access to the device memory via usb while running a linux distro. You can't access the shares via usb unless you have access using wifi enabled. + usb has a far faster transfer speed than wifi.
The sd card is easily accessible via usb by simply enabling mass storage mode.

Below is the comment I originally replied to. The different with the playbook, is the playbook has a separate 'file sharing' toggle. On the z10, enabling wifi access also enables what would be file sharing on the playbook (mounting shares via usb)

Originally Posted by advil_yum

I thought I would mention what I did last night to get my Z10 connected to Linux... well, not really in the same manor as what you're trying, but it was a solution that worked for me. PS: I'm using Mageia 2 x86 and my Z10 does NOT have an SD card in it. I believe Mass Storage only works when you have a memory card in, but I don't have one to test currently. BlackBerry no longer allows access to built-in memory directly through mass storage. Must be for security reasons and it's very annoying. Once again Linux users are left to defend for themselves. :nerd:

I was about to head out for a walk with the dog and wanted to load up some music, so plugged it in and nothing happened. I tried to mount it similar to what this thread mentions and how you do it on the Playbook, but that didn't work either.