Bug 481830

I use an SMB4k network collection myself for testing purposes and it works without any problems. Create a debug log (terminal) from the start of digiKam as described here:

https://www.digikam.org/contribute/

Maik

That doesn't show a lot
qt.core.logging: Ignoring malformed logging rule: 'digikam*=true~'
QSocketNotifier: Can only be used with threads started with QThread
digikam.facedb: Cannot found faces engine model "shapepredictor.dat"
digikam.facedb: Faces recognition feature cannot be used!
digikam.facedb: Cannot found faces engine DNN model "openface_nn4.small2.v1.t7"
digikam.facedb: Faces recognition feature cannot be used!
Hspell: can't open /usr/share/hspell/hebrew.wgz.sizes.
kf.sonnet.clients.hspell: HSpellDict::HSpellDict: Init failed
kf.xmlgui: Unhandled container to remove :  Digikam::DigikamApp
digikam.qtav.warn: can not load cuda!

Please activate the debug output with the following command:

export QT_LOGGING_RULES="digikam*=true"

The messages are not relevant to the problem, we need the log from the beginning here.

Maik

Here it is

digikam.general: No DB settings changes. Do nothing...
digikam.database: addLocation QUrl("file:///home/carl/smb4k/192.168.1.155/carl")
digikam.database: Creating new Location  "/"  uuid  "networkshareid:?mountpath=/home/carl/smb4k/192.168.1.155/carl"
digikam.database: Found Location "/home/carl/Pictures/DigikamDB" with file uuid "7d3b315d..."
digikam.database: Location for "/home/carl/Pictures/DigikamDB" is available: true => case sensitivity: 2
digikam.database: Location for "/home/carl/smb4k/192.168.1.155/carl" is available: false => case sensitivity: 0
digikam.general: Added root album called:  "carl"
digikam.avplayer: decoderPriority not changed
digikam.avplayer: sync end
digikam.metaengine: ExifTool config path: "/usr/bin/exiftool"
digikam.dimg: Desktop platform is not X11
(hundreds of the X11 messages)
....
digikam.metaengine: ExifTool config path: "/usr/bin/exiftool"
digikam.widgets: [LocalizeContainer] enableSpellCheck(false), defaultLanguage(""), ignoredWords(("digiKam", "Showfoto", "Apple", "Nikon", "Android", "Canon", "Sony", "Samsung", "Panasonic", "Olympus", "Exif", "IPTC", "Xmp")), translatorEngine(Digikam::DOnlineTranslator::Google), translatorLang(()), alternativeLang(()), 
digikam.general: scan mode: CompleteCollectionScan
digikam.database: items to tag ()
digikam.database: Complete scan took: 23 msecs.
digikam.geoiface: ----
digikam.general: total scan value :  5
digikam.general: total scan value :  6
digikam.general: Event is dispatched to KDE desktop notifier
digikam.database: Complete scan (file scanning deferred) took: 9 msecs.
digikam.geoiface: ----
digikam.qtav: Not playing~
digikam.qtav: Not playing~
digikam.avplayer: sync end
digikam.general: Cancel Main Thread
digikam.general: Finish Main Thread
digikam.metaengine: ExifToolProcess::terminate(): send ExifTool shutdown command...
digikam.metaengine: ExifTool process finished with code: 0 and status QProcess::NormalExit

The collection is recognized as unavailable. Since no file UUID is found yet, I suspect that no file or directory is recognized. The requirement in digiKam for a network collection to be added is that at least one file or directory in the path already exists.

But you're not using a digiKam Snap or Flatpak package now? These use a sandbox and digiKam has no file permissions outside of the home directory. In this case use our AppImage.

Maik

As far as I know, no, this is a straightforward installation. I installed it through Discover in the Neon distro. It got installed from a jammy repo. 
When I navigate to the share folder, strange thing is I cannot see other folders inside it. I can when I point to a local folder on the SSD. But of course Digikam is running under the same user that can access the share when mounted.

If there are other folders in your share, but you do not see them within a digiKam file requester, digiKam's rights are restricted.
The whole thing can be tested quickly if you use our AppImage from here (make AppImage executable):

https://files.kde.org/digikam/

Maik

If my research is correct, Neon is based on Ubuntu-22.04. Since there is no native digiKam for Ubuntu, I think you are using a Snap package with sandbox function.
For me it is inexplicable how distributions can create/publish such program packages in Snap or Flatpak format that are practically unusable. For a small text editor mark it will be ok, but for digiKam it is useless.

Maik

Thanks for looking into this further. Yes, I think Neon is based on Ubuntu 22.04 (jammy) so you may well be right. I cannot right now test the app image but will do so as soon as I get back to my own machine and will let you know. If that works, then I'll raise a bug with Neon.

I just tried the appimage and guess what, it works! Must say a bit disappointed in the Ubuntu package maintainers. Guess I should go back to a real Debian based distro....
Cheers for looking into this and helping me out. I'd never have guessed this to be the issue.