How do I get my laptop screen backlight brightness controls to work?

Question

What do I need to do to get my laptop screen backlight brightness controls to work? I currently have Ubuntu 13.04 and a Dell Studio 1558.

After reading these two links:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1007765
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2061712

I attempted the following, I change the permissions (since I was having errors editing the files)

sudo chmod a+w /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness

And then I overwrote the file with 1000 (appears max_brightness is 4882)

sudo echo 1000 > /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness

And lo and behold, my screen dimmed.

I've tweaked it before, I'm not sure exactly how, and I don't know why I had to change the permissions on the file again, if I did it that way before.

How can I adjust brightness with the standard keys?

totti · Accepted Answer · 2014-01-26T05:45:54.820

7

xbacklight

$ xbacklight +30% # increases brightness by 30 percent
$ xbacklight -30% # decreases brightness by 30 percent

dbus way

$ dbus-send --session --print-reply \
      --dest="org.gnome.SettingsDaemon" \
      /org/gnome/SettingsDaemon/Power \
      org.gnome.SettingsDaemon.Power.Screen.SetPercentage \
      uint32:<percentage>

Example

Set brightness to 30%:

$ dbus-send --session --print-reply \
      --dest="org.gnome.SettingsDaemon" \
      /org/gnome/SettingsDaemon/Power \
      org.gnome.SettingsDaemon.Power.Screen.SetPercentage \
      uint32:30

Or
To decrease brightness by a step (~7)

$ dbus-send --session --print-reply \
      --dest="org.gnome.SettingsDaemon" \
      /org/gnome/SettingsDaemon/Power \
      org.gnome.SettingsDaemon.Power.Screen.StepDown

To increase brightness by a step (~7)

$ dbus-send --session --print-reply \
      --dest="org.gnome.SettingsDaemon" \
      /org/gnome/SettingsDaemon/Power \
      org.gnome.SettingsDaemon.Power.Screen.StepUp

If it says as follows your OS may be too old. Then use xdotool:

Error org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.UnknownMethod: 
Method "SetPercentage" with signature "u" on interface 
"org.gnome.SettingsDaemon.Power.Screen" doesn't exist

xdotool

Increase brightness:
```
$ xdotool key XF86MonBrightnessUp
```
Decrease brightness:
```
$ xdotool key XF86MonBrightnessDown
```

edited Jan 26 '14 at 05:45

answered Jan 16 '14 at 09:20

totti

1,464
14
15

Your "dbus way" works only with Gnome (and also if you run gnome-settings-daemon independently, for example with plain window manager such as openbox). – Jan 16 '14 at 11:40
Accepting because it's the only one :D – Aaron Hall Jan 26 '14 at 05:31
Does it work ?. – totti Jan 26 '14 at 05:38
Also See : http://askubuntu.com/questions/409378/changing-brightness-at-startup – totti Jan 26 '14 at 05:39
1

The dbus way gives me this error: `Error org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.UnknownMethod: No such method 'SetPercentage'` – xuhdev Nov 28 '14 at 07:36
I'm on the latest stable GNOME 3.14.2 (Not able to edit the comments above) – xuhdev Nov 28 '14 at 07:59

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 29 '16 at 02:10

Here 2 alternative scripts.

Save it as brightness_change.sh and put it in a folder that is part of your $PATH environment variable. The usage is simple: brightness_change.sh up / brightness_change.sh down.

You can then assign the script to a keybinding, just take care to specify the full path to the command.

1. DBUS script ( for gnome )

I prefer the Dbus approach because :

you don't need special permission to change the brightness
the brightness changes done by script are reflected in the brightness applet

Here the script

#!/bin/bash
function up(){
    dbus-send --session --type="method_call"  --dest="org.gnome.SettingsDaemon" /org/gnome/SettingsDaemon/Power org.gnome.SettingsDaemon.Power.Screen.StepUp
}

function down(){    
    dbus-send --session --type="method_call" --dest="org.gnome.SettingsDaemon" "/org/gnome/SettingsDaemon/Power" "org.gnome.SettingsDaemon.Power.Screen.StepDown"
}

if [[ $1 = "up" ]]
then
     up
elif [[ $1 = "down" ]]
then        
    down
fi

2. Using the /sys/ files

Using this method requires either you change the permission of the destination file in /sys/ (every boot) either you can had the command to /etc/sudoers to require no passwords

I was not sure how to implement the first way so I have added this line to the /etc/sudoers ( where fra is my user )

fra ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:/home/fra/bin/bright_change.sh

Now you can call the command with sudo without you get prompted for password ( it for sure an hole in the security so take care of that )

#!/bin/bash
file="/sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness"
level=$(cat $file)
inc=100

if [ $level -lt "600" ]
then
    inc=50
fi

function up(){
    newlevel=$(($level+$inc))
    echo $newlevel
}

function down(){    
    newlevel=$(($level-$inc))

    if [ $newlevel -lt "10" ]
    then
        newlevel=1
    elif [ $newlevel -lt "100" ]
    then
        newlevel=10
    fi
    echo $newlevel
}


if [[ $1 = "up" ]]
then
     newlevel=$(up)
elif [[ $1 = "down" ]]
then        
    newlevel=$(down)
fi  


echo $newlevel
# echo $level

echo $newlevel > $file

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 15 '15 at 14:03

Well I actually didn't do what the accepted answer says. This is a function in my .bashrc:

bright () { sudo sh -c "echo $1 > /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness " ; }

I use it like this -

Full brightness:

$ bright 4882

About one-tenth brightness:

$ bright 482

And because the function uses sudo, I have to type in my password, which is ok with me.

How do I get my laptop screen backlight brightness controls to work?

3 Answers3

xbacklight

dbus way

xdotool