Bug 433988

Summary:	plasma systemmonitor network device sensors not selectable as long the device is not connected
Product:	[Applications] plasma-systemmonitor	Reporter:	Till Schäfer <till2.schaefer>
Component:	general	Assignee:	KSysGuard Developers <ksysguard-bugs>
Status:	REOPENED ---
Severity:	normal	CC:	ahiemstra, jesper, kde, nate, plasma-bugs
Priority:	NOR
Version:	5.23.2
Target Milestone:	---
Platform:	Other
OS:	Linux
Latest Commit:		Version Fixed In:
Sentry Crash Report:

Description Till Schäfer 2021-03-05 08:48:51 UTC

When configuring the plasma systemmonitor to display network device statistics, the sensor list of devices does not contain disconnected devices. E.g., on need to be connected to a wired network to add the wired interface to a widget. 

Operating System: Gentoo Linux
KDE Plasma Version: 5.21.2
KDE Frameworks Version: 5.79.0
Qt Version: 5.15.2
Kernel Version: 5.10.19-gentoo
OS Type: 64-bit
Graphics Platform: X11
Processors: 8 × Intel® Core™ i7-4810MQ CPU @ 2.80GHz
Memory: 15.5 GiB of RAM
Graphics Processor: Mesa DRI Intel® HD Graphics 4600

Comment 1 David Edmundson 2021-03-12 12:01:04 UTC

I don't see why this is a problem in real life? 

There are infinite potential devices one could have that are disconnected and to try showing them opens up a can of worms. Both technical and for UX.

Comment 2 Till Schäfer 2021-03-12 16:10:04 UTC

I reported it, because I wanted to add some widgets to my desktop in order to display network usage for LAN and WLAN while I was traveling. For me it is important to separate these traffic statistics because I want to check if my laptop is actually using LAN or WLAN for transfer in some circumstances.

I was not able to add the LAN widget until I was home in order to connect my laptop to a wired network. I think adding a LAN widget is quite common and also makes sense in a "no cable plugged in" state. 

Maybe I was a bit unclear what I mean with disconnected devices. I was not talking about potential hardware devices I may connect to my computer via usb or so.  I am talking about devices actually present at my computer, but either not connected to a wire or not connected to a wifi. I guess there are not that many in desktop computers. 

Maybe the problem of understanding my problem here is the mixed naming of the devices, because the category says devides (which are LAN1 (enp0s1), LAN2 (eth0), WIFI(wlp...), etc for me), the content are also devices, but their are named by the connected network (which is something else in my understanding). I already opened another bug report for this issue: Bug 433951

Comment 3 Arjen Hiemstra 2023-01-18 11:29:55 UTC

*** Bug 459091 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***