First let's be sure that the phone connects through USB the right way :

Here are the messages in /var/log/syslog when the phone is connected (and the "phone mode" is kept on the phone : not the memorystick mode) :

Nov 11 17:31:57 rms kernel: usb 2-2: new full speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 8
Nov 11 17:31:57 rms kernel: usb 2-2: configuration #3 chosen from 1 choice
Nov 11 17:31:57 rms kernel: cdc_acm 2-2:3.1: ttyACM0: USB ACM device
Nov 11 17:31:57 rms kernel: cdc_acm 2-2:3.3: ttyACM1: USB ACM device
Nov 11 17:31:57 rms kernel: usbcore: registered new driver cdc_acm
Nov 11 17:31:57 rms kernel: drivers/usb/class/cdc-acm.c: v0.25:USB Abstract Control Model driver for USB modems and ISDN adapters
Nov 11 17:31:58 rms kernel: usb0: register 'cdc_ether' at usb-0000:00:03.0-2, CDC Ethernet Device, 02:80:37:18:03:00
Nov 11 17:31:58 rms kernel: usbcore: registered new driver cdc_ether

You should then see something like this issueing lsusb :

Bus 002 Device 007: ID 0fce:d046 Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB

(note that in the snippets copy pasted here, the numbering of the device on the USB bus changed, as I plugged it and removed it between the various experiments)

The phone should be useable then, but most probably, it will be accessible only as root user, as udev creates the corresponding devices with basic (root) permissions by default. We'll try to adapt this so that it can be accessed by any user in the dialout group.

Next, let's try and check the phone's characteristics in udev (you will need to adapt the path given bellow to the USB device numbers seen in lsusb above) :

# udevinfo -a -p /class/usb_device/usbdev2.8

  looking at device '/class/usb_device/usbdev2.8':
    KERNEL=="usbdev2.8"
    SUBSYSTEM=="usb_device"
    DRIVER==""
    ATTR{dev}=="189:135"

  looking at parent device '/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:03.0/usb2/2-2':
    KERNELS=="2-2"
    SUBSYSTEMS=="usb"
    DRIVERS=="usb"
    ATTRS{configuration}=="WMC Device"
    ATTRS{serial}=="3517090195964940"
    ATTRS{product}=="Sony Ericsson K610"
    ATTRS{manufacturer}=="Sony Ericsson"
    ATTRS{maxchild}=="0"
    ATTRS{version}==" 2.00"
    ATTRS{devnum}=="8"
    ATTRS{speed}=="12"
    ATTRS{bMaxPacketSize0}=="64"
    ATTRS{bNumConfigurations}=="1"
    ATTRS{bDeviceProtocol}=="00"
    ATTRS{bDeviceSubClass}=="00"
    ATTRS{bDeviceClass}=="02"
    ATTRS{bcdDevice}=="0000"
    ATTRS{idProduct}=="d046"
    ATTRS{idVendor}=="0fce"
    ATTRS{bMaxPower}=="500mA"
    ATTRS{bmAttributes}=="80"
    ATTRS{bConfigurationValue}=="3"
    ATTRS{bNumInterfaces}=="10"

Thanks to http://www.enterprisenetworkingplanet.com/nethub/article.php/3635686 and http://www.enterprisenetworkingplanet.com/nethub/article.php/3637076 for usefull details on UDEV setup.

This suggests that this phone obeys the WMC Device specification (WMC : Wireless Mobile Communication : http://www.usb.org/developers/devclass_docs/cdc_wmc10.zip), which means it understands OBEX commands.

Based on the above informations, it's safe to think that the phone can be configured in UDEV like the following.

Add a line suh as the following into /etc/udev/rules.d/020_permissions.rules :

SUBSYSTEM=="usb_device",                        GROUP="dialout", \
        ATTRS{configuration}=="WMC Device"

or maybe something like :

SUBSYSTEM=="usb_device",                        GROUP="dialout", \
        ATTRS{idVendor}=="0fce", ATTRS{idProduct}=="d046"

I suspect the first one to be more generic, but I'm not so completely sure... any reports on your side may be helpfull.

Now, if you issue the following command, then unplug the phone and plug it again, you should be able to access it if your user is in the dialout group :

udevcontrol reload_rules

Now, we will try and access the contents of the phone through OpenOBEX tools. Thanks to http://dburr.veritel.com.au/nokia/ for useful commands.

First check that the phone is recognised through the USB interface :

$ obex_test -u
Using USB transport, querying available interfaces
Interface 0: Sony Ericsson Sony Ericsson K610 Sony Ericsson Device 046 USB WMC OBEX Interface

You should then be able to list the base of contents of the phone with :

$ obexftp -u 0 -l
Connecting...done
Receiving "(null)"... <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE folder-listing SYSTEM "obex-folder-listing.dtd">
<!--
 XML Coder, (C) 2001 Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB
-->
<folder-listing version="1.0"><folder name="Mémoire téléphone"/>
<folder name="Memory Stick"/>
</folder-listing>
done
Disconnecting...done

Every operations should be possible then with obexftp, like getting or putting files on the phone or on its memory stick. More details at : http://openobex.triq.net/devices/sony-ericsson#sonyericsson_k610i . This mentions using options like -U synch which relate to the use of OBEX services, which are described at http://openobex.triq.net/obexftp/services.

I've found the command line nice, but found a useful tool to add a GUI over obexftp : obextool.

It's packaged for Debian and available at : http://www.stud.uni-karlsruhe.de/~ubq7/debian/ (thanks to http://wiki.splitbrain.org/nokia_6630).

The documentation for obextool is available here : http://www.tech-edv.co.at/programmierung/obextool/en/detail.html

In order for it to recognise the phone, you should start it with the following command line options :

$ OBEXCMD="obexftp -u 0" obextool
or
$ obextool --obexcmd "obexftp -u 0"

Update: In the meantime, as suggested in one of the comments bellow, I've tried and successfully used ObexFS which integrates much better with all the tools.

For users of the Gnome platform, you may prefer to use ObexFS (over FUSE) in order to access the phone contents from Nautilus directly instead of using obextool.

Setting-up obexfs required the following steps (as root) (thanks to http://www.bani.com.br/?p=10) :

  1. adding the user to the fuse group (adduser youuser fuse)
  2. add the following line in /etc/fstab : obexfs#-u0 /media/phone fuse defaults,user 0 0
  3. create a /media/phone directory belonging to the fuse group : mkdir /media/phone
  4. chgrp fuse /media/phone
  5. chmod g+w /media/phone

An icon for the phone should then be manageable by gnome/nautilus, to mount it, or you may use pmount /media/phone as the standard user.

To unmount it you must use the fusermount -u /media/phone command, as pmount and FUSE are not yet fully integrated.




I hope this will allow you to discover more usefull ways to use the phone with you GNU/Linux system.




Please don't hesitate to provide enhancements for this documents.




Update 2008/01/21 : I've just found out that the phone can now be browsed with Nautilus, by using the "Browse device" right-click menu of the bluetooth icon in the gnome tray... and it works like a charm. At least this works on my Debian testing machine. no additional steps required with bluetooth ! Cool ;)