After all the work I'd put into getting suspend to work, I thought I was done at last. However, in grand fresh-Linux-install tradition, I discovered that my backlight dimming was no longer working. This seemed odd as it's always worked without any special attention from me.

Lots of googling later, I found a solution, even if it wasn't exactly what was working before:

# smart install fnfx
# service fnfxd start
# chkconfig --levels 345 fnfxd on

Not only does this let me use the Toshiba function keys, it also allows me to reprogram them =)

You can read the fine manual for fnfx here.

In FC7 and earlier, it appeared that HAL/pm-utils was managing the LCD backlight (GNOME brightness-applet worked, Toshiba function keys caused a little dialog to appear showing the brightness level, etc). This is no longer the case (applet doesn't do anything, no info dialog, etc), but it works, so I'm not going to complain too much.

As an aside, it appears to me that what has changed since FC7 is that HAL no longer recognizes my display (it shows up as "generic LCD" rather than the specific model and "lshal" doesn't list it at all). Not sure how to fix this. I may look into it more later, since having it properly supported would be good. For now just working is satisfactory. Still, if you have any hints, please feel free to drop them here =)

UPDATE: I did an update tonight, and after a reboot things are back to normal. Not sure which package it was that fixed it. I do notice that HAL is once again seeing my lcd though:

# lshal | grep panel
info.capabilities = {'laptop_panel'} (string list)
info.category = 'laptop_panel'  (string)
laptop_panel.access_method = 'general'  (string)
laptop_panel.num_levels = 8  (0x8)  (int)