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I recently converted my Surface book 2 to ubuntu 16.04 using a USB. However, for whatever reason, the battery indicator is missing

enter image description here

I have tried some of the other solutions on this site, but none of them have worked for me. Here's a few other screenshots that might help (I have my power adapter connected during these screenshots):

(Settings > Power) enter image description here

enter image description here

EDIT: From one of the answers below, please see my terminal output. It says the command doesn't exist, but also that indicator-power is installed.

enter image description here enter image description here enter image description here

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  • I ran into this on another question where I tried, unsuccessfully, to help. The problem seems to be "Windows Surface" and kernel (and possibly secure boot) - both a bit out of my lane. There is apparently another kernel that needs to be installed and they are also version dependent. If someone a bit better than me could use the following links to assist both of these folks, I'm sure it would be appreciated. askubuntu.com/questions/1295073/… ...there are additional links on that question.
    – WU-TANG
    Dec 6, 2020 at 5:25

4 Answers 4

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I'd make sure the power indicator is installed first:

indicator-power

And if it isn't, then I'd install it:

sudo apt-get install indicator-power

If it is installed, then it might have just crashed. I'd try restarting it:

/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/indicator-power/indicator-power-service &disown

And if that's still not working, then I'd reinstall it:

sudo apt-get purge indicator-power
sudo apt-get install indicator-power
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  • 1
    Thanks! I tried this, but it didn't seem to work. Could you check my edited question? Dec 2, 2020 at 20:13
  • What do you see when you run "gsettings list-recursively | grep settings-daemon.plugins.power"? You should see a line that says "org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power active true" but I'm wondering if you're going to see "org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power active false"
    – krebshack
    Dec 2, 2020 at 23:59
  • Ran that, and I see the active true line,. Dec 3, 2020 at 5:41
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One solution I’ve seen work with a couple of different Surface models is to use Gnome Tweaks:

  1. sudo apt install gnome-tweaks
  2. sudo ln -s /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libusbmuxd.so.6.0.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libusbmuxd.so.4
  3. sudo systemctl restart upower

From here, you can open the gnome-tweaks application, choose "top bar", then toggle battery percentage.

Hope this helps.

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  • I'm getting this error "ln: failed to create symbolic link '/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libusbmuxd.so.4': File exists", could you help (thanks for the answer!) Dec 6, 2020 at 19:01
  • Could you confirm the existence of the libusbmuxd file with this: ll /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libusbmuxd*. You should see the file above, and possibly a symbolic link as well.
    – user1091774
    Dec 7, 2020 at 4:42
  • yes, i see both of them Dec 7, 2020 at 6:23
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This is an answer, with included comments.

  1. Try installing gnome-tweaks

    sudo apt-get install gnome-tweaks
    gnome-tweaks &
    

    and activating the Battery percentage. You reported an error, but it is not clear at which point you got it.

enter image description here

  1. Try options here. It is a post from askubuntu.com, so a copy is not needed.

  2. Check (and report) the output of

     gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface show-battery-percentage
    

    If false try setting it to true with

     gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface show-battery-percentage true
    
  3. Check (and report) the output of

     sudo service upower status
    

    If not active try enabling it with

     sudo service upower start
    
  4. Try installing battery-status

     sudo add-apt-repository ppa:iaz/battery-status && sudo apt-get update
     sudo apt-get install battery-status
     /usr/lib/battery-status/battery-status --indicator
    
  5. Try a newer Ubuntu. (I know this is not a solution just to fix the battery indicator, but you may get a lot of extra benefits). Related:

    5.1. Can I run Ubuntu on a Surface laptop?

    5.2. https://www.reddit.com/r/SurfaceLinux/comments/b9t1jd/full_guide_on_getting_ubuntu_1804_working_on/

    5.3. https://www.most-useful.com/ubuntu-20-04-linux-on-surface-pro-4-working-pretty-well.html

  6. With battery-monitor YMMV. See https://www.2daygeek.com/monitor-laptop-battery-charging-state-linux/ also


Note that indicator-power seems buggy

  1. Indicator-Power-Message: exiting: service couldn't acquire or lost ownership of busname

  2. https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/indicator-power/+bug/1257251?comments=all


Related

  1. No battery status icon

  2. ubuntu 16 battery indicator has disappeared

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i had problem with ubuntu 20.04.02

$ sudo systemctl restart upower

Job for upower.service failed because a fatal signal was delivered to the control process. See "systemctl status upower.service" and "journalctl -xe" for details.

checking with

 $ systemctl --failed

UNIT LOAD ACTIVE SUB DESCRIPTION
● upower.service loaded failed failed Daemon for power management

so i had to install

$ sudo apt install systemd:amd64 systemd-timesyncd:amd64

and now service started and battery indicator is back

$ sudo systemctl start upower

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