Perl and Net::DBus questions

[Madison Kelly]

Hi all,

   I'm working on a perl program which needs to keep track of what 
(block) devices are available and what their individual details are. 
Also, I want to be able to keep similar track of what network 
filesystems are currently mounted and their details.

   From what I have been reading, it looks like DBus and HAL are right
up my alley. I've been reading the docs on the freedesktop.org website, 
but most of it uses C++, Java and Python when talking about bindings. 
Unfortunately, I am kind of still new to programming and am only 
comfortable really with Perl, so a lot of these analogies are lost on me.

   So, has anyone here played much DBus/HAL in perl (with Net::DBus)? 
I've looked at the code in 'examples' in the DBus docs directory, but 
it's pretty sparse, as are the notes on CPAN.

   I am certainly not asking for anyone to "do my work" for me, and even 
a link to docs that are more perl/Net::DBus focused would be a *huge* help!

   This is what I am trying to figure out; pointers to more docs would 
be perfect in lieu of code samples!

1: I want to initially query to the system bus for a list of current
devices.
    1.1: For each device detected, see if it is a block device (HDD, USB
storage, Optical, etc).
    1.2: If it is a block device, query it's details (max/used capacity,
FS type, mount location [less important is make, model, serial,
removable, optical media capability, SMART codes, etc).
2: After the initial scan, "subscribe" to the system bus and wait for
new signals/messages.
    2.1: Whenever a new message arrives, check if it's for a block device
and, if so, repeat 1.2.
3: Do the same for Network Block devices.

If anyone can help get me started, I would be much appreciated. As of 
now, I've been able to do this much, which queries the 'Manager' system 
bus, but no more. I am not even sure how to find out what objects are on 
a given (ie: system) bus. =/

A confused Madi.


-=] test.pl [=-
#!/usr/bin/perl
#
# My crappy Net::DBus script for learning.

use strict;
use warnings;
use IO::Handle;
use Net::DBus;

my @key_words=("volume", "usb", "storage");

# Connect to DBus.
my $bus = Net::DBus->system;

# Get a handle to the HAL service
my $hal = $bus->get_service("org.freedesktop.Hal");

# Get the device manager
# my $manager = $hal->get_object("/org/freedesktop/Hal/Manager", 
"org.freedesktop.Hal.Manager");
my $manager = $hal->get_object("/org/freedesktop/Hal/Manager", 
"org.freedesktop.Hal.Manager");

# Show the devices currently seen by DBus
foreach my $dev (sort { $a cmp $b } @{$manager->GetAllDevices})
{
	my $want=0;
	foreach my $key (@key_words)
	{
		if ( $dev=~/$key/ )
		{
			$want=1;
			last;
		}
	}
	if ( $want == 1 )
	{
		print "Yar!: $dev\n";
	}
	else
	{
		print "Boo!: $dev\n";
	}
}