Hi, I'm in a similar situation as the original reporter; I want to use my password manager to enter my GPG passphrase but pinentry-gnome3 is fully modal, so I installed pinentry-qt but it doesn't appear to work. I'm using Ubuntu 20.04 (yes I know this is a Debian bug report, but I hope this might help get this issue fixed).
I tried the test and I see this in my terminal: gpg-connect-agent: no running gpg-agent - starting '/usr/bin/gpg-agent' gpg-connect-agent: waiting for the agent to come up ... (5s) gpg-connect-agent: connection to agent established ERR 67108949 No pinentry <GPG Agent> Content of gpg-agent.log: 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772766] listening on socket '/run/user/1000/gnupg/d.xsj3tnu6mn6647naay7ouamr/S.gpg-agent' 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772766] listening on socket '/run/user/1000/gnupg/d.xsj3tnu6mn6647naay7ouamr/S.gpg-agent.extra' 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772766] listening on socket '/run/user/1000/gnupg/d.xsj3tnu6mn6647naay7ouamr/S.gpg-agent.browser' 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772766] listening on socket '/run/user/1000/gnupg/d.xsj3tnu6mn6647naay7ouamr/S.gpg-agent.ssh' 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] gpg-agent (GnuPG) 2.2.19 started 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK Pleased to meet you, process 1772764 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- RESET 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION ttyname=/dev/pts/14 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION ttytype=xterm-256color 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION display=:0 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION xauthority=/run/user/1000/gdm/Xauthority 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION putenv=XMODIFIERS=@im=ibus 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION putenv=GTK_IM_MODULE=ibus 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION putenv=DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS=unix:path=/run/user/1000/bus 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION putenv=QT_IM_MODULE=ibus 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION lc-ctype=en_CA.UTF-8 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- OPTION lc-messages=en_CA.UTF-8 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> OK 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- GET_CONFIRMATION Hello 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] starting a new PIN Entry 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_11 <- [eof] 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_11 -> BYE 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] can't connect to the PIN entry module '/usr/bin/pinentry-qt': End of file 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: error calling pinentry: No pinentry <GPG Agent> 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] command 'GET_CONFIRMATION' failed: No pinentry 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 -> ERR 67108949 No pinentry <GPG Agent> 2020-05-29 16:20:23 gpg-agent[1772767] DBG: chan_10 <- [eof] (I should add that I tried this test in a VM using the Debian 10.4.0 live iso but I wasn't able to reproduce the error. I suspect if I tried this in a Debian install instead of a live iso session I would get a similar result.) When I try this with the default (systemd-managed) gpg-agent, I see this in my system log: May 29 16:38:50 computer gpg-agent[1794812]: Unable to init server: Could not connect: Connection refused May 29 16:38:50 computer pinentry[1794812]: cannot open display: There is a similar bug report for Ubuntu[1], where the last comment[2] suggests a workaround by adding keep-display to gpg-agent.conf. Connecting this with the above system log messages, I tried adding keep-display and it appears to work. (Someone else had posted to Ask Ubuntu[3] about what looks like a similar issue. While the poster wasn't sure what the exact fix was, keep-display is among the options for gpg-agent.) Hope this helps, Jeff [1]: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pinentry/+bug/1509699 [2]: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pinentry/+bug/1509699/comments/5 [3]: https://askubuntu.com/questions/127213/files-e-mail-not-signed-with-kleopatra-kmail-gpg-agent
