[PLUG] How to make my laptop look like a USB charger?

[Eric House]

> charging from laptop while being a usb hotspot via xml config file
> before you go screwing around with cutting off lines of a  usb cable take a
> look at this:
> http://techtalk.hawkenterprising.com/Members/hawke/mifi-2200-charging-via-usb-while-still-running-in-wifi-access-point-mode
> 
> basically you save the mifi's settings to a config file, modify the xml file
> and reload the modified file.
> worked for me back in september.

I posted, after reading the above but not testing it, that this was
exactly what I wanted.  Having tested it, however, I must retract.  It
turns out that not all MiFi devices are created equal.  The Virgin
Wireless one I have doesn't even have the XML element referenced in
the above article in its config file.  Adding it doesn't help; the
device deletes it, presumably because it's unrecognized.  Bottom line
by my experience and some more targeted googling (thanks to having the
name of the element) is that the Verizon version of the MiFi supports
this and the Virgin one does not.  I'm not sure about Sprint.

The recommended best solution for Virgin is to make or buy a
power-only USB cable.  I'm going to try hacking udev config files
before I go that route.

Oh, and one other note.  A friend with the same device/carrier got
this working by changing the <poweronconnect> element from 0 to 1.
But it stopped working after he rebooted and he can't make it work
again.  So either he's wrong about the wifi having worked (his laptop
may have been clever enough to set up ethernet-over-usb) or he was
taking advantage of a bug in the device that might be exploitable
again.

Thanks,

--Eric
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