# Unable to get Handspring visor to talk to pilot-link

## billatq

Recently, I tried getting my visor to once again work with linux (I'd used it before with red hat) and was unable to do so. I did the following:

Turn on USB support, directly into the kernel

Turn on the Preliminary USB filesystem, directly into the kernel

Activated the (NEW) UHCI USB controller support, directly into the kernel

Turned on the USB Serial Converter, directly into the kernel

Turned on the handspring visor driver, directly into the kernel

This is what happens in the dmesg when I press the hotsync button:

```
hub.c: USB new device connect on bus1/2, assigned device number 10

usbserial.c: Handspring Visor converter detected

visor.c: Handspring Visor: Number of ports: 2

visor.c: Handspring Visor: port 1, is for Generic use and is bound to ttyUSB0

visor.c: Handspring Visor: port 2, is for HotSync use and is bound to ttyUSB1

usbserial.c: Handspring Visor converter now attached to ttyUSB0 (or usb/tts/0 for devfs)

usbserial.c: Handspring Visor converter now attached to ttyUSB1 (or usb/tts/1 for devfs)

usb.c: USB disconnect on device 10

usbserial.c: Handspring Visor converter now disconnected from ttyUSB0

usbserial.c: Handspring Visor converter now disconnected from ttyUSB1

```

Here are the permissions in /dev/usb/tts:

```
crw-rw----    1 root     pda      188,   0 Dec 31  1969 0

crw-rw----    1 root     pda      188,   1 Dec 31  1969 1

```

I am in the pda group.

This is the error message that I get when I try to make a backup:

```
bash-2.05a# pilot-xfer -p /dev/ttyUSB1 -b visorbackup

   Unable to bind to port '/dev/ttyUSB1'

```

So, I'm kinda stuck here. It appears as if it should work, but maybe I'm missing something. When I searched, I came across this post:

https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=1579 which didn't seem to clarify things, though did bring hotplug to my attention. However, I don't see why that package would be required. I followed the steps for the most part here: http://www.linuxpda.com/visor/howto/v0.5/x71.html

--Bill

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## amasidlover

If you note the messages in dmesg it says that with devfs enabled the two devices are /dev/usb/tts/0 and /dev/usb/tts/1 .

hence :

```
pilot-xfer -p /dev/usb/tts/1 -b visorbackup
```

Hope that helps[/code]

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## billatq

```
sh-2.05a$ pilot-xfer -p /dev/usb/tts/1 -b visorbackup

   Unable to bind to port '/dev/usb/tts/1'

```

Well, it doesn't seem to want to work with that either.

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## amasidlover

Are you a memeber of the group pda when you issue the command?

 Alternatively you could do chmod a+rw on /dev/tts/1 and that would eliminate any issues with permissions.

The other possibility is that if you issue the pilot-xfer command before you press the hotsync button, the device doesn't exist... I believe you can get around this by creating a symlink to /dev/pilot or similar, while the /dev/usb/tts/1 exists, and using that.

Hope this helps,

Alex

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## billatq

Well, I am a member of the pda group, and I set the permissions to rw on it and even tried it as root to no avail. Does anyone know what these hotplug scripts that they were talking about in the other post do?

----------

