I have noticed that in the gnome-control-center when I enable Aeroplane Mode that Bluetooth no longer becomes an option to be turned on, though this is reversed when disabling Aeroplane Mode. Wifi though does not seem to be disabled with the enabling of this mode.
I am running Ubuntu GNOME 16.04 with GNOME 3.20 and I am just really curious, what exactly does enabling with mode disable? Is there a list of modules it blacklists or something?
Aeroplane mode disables the Wifi (or WLan), bluetooth and Telephony (2G/3G etc) signals. This can be seen from system log. Also This wikipedia article says same thing about airplane mode or Aeroplane mode -
When the "airplane mode" is activated, it disables all voice and text telephony and other signal-transmitting technologies such as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
And this Gnome Help article says, more clearly
Using Airplane Mode will completely turn off all wireless connections, including WiFi, 3G and Bluetooth connections.
When it's disabled I find entry in systemlog like these
Sep 10 16:14:13 anwar-pc NetworkManager[957]: <info> [1473502453.7404] manager: WiFi now disabled by radio killswitch
Sep 10 16:14:13 anwar-pc NetworkManager[957]: <info> [1473502453.7616] device (20:54:76:75:5B:C6): state change: disconnected -> unmanaged (reason 'removed') [30 10 36]
Sep 10 16:14:13 anwar-pc URfkill[864]: device_changed_cb: ideapad_bluetooth
Sep 10 16:14:13 anwar-pc URfkill[864]: device_changed_cb: hci0
When disabled, The entries are like this
Sep 10 16:15:31 anwar-pc NetworkManager[957]: <info> [1473502531.8393] manager: WiFi now enabled by radio killswitch
Sep 10 16:15:31 anwar-pc systemd[1]: Starting Load/Save RF Kill Switch Status...
Sep 10 16:15:31 anwar-pc systemd[1]: Started Load/Save RF Kill Switch Status.
Sep 10 16:15:31 anwar-pc URfkill[864]: device_changed_cb: ideapad_bluetooth
Sep 10 16:15:31 anwar-pc URfkill[864]: device_changed_cb: hci0
Sep 10 16:15:32 anwar-pc NetworkManager[957]: <info> [1473502532.0363] manager: (20:54:76:75:5B:C6): new Bluetooth device (/org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/Devices/17)
In the first log, device (20:54:76:75:5B:C6) is the bluetooth device.
