Xfce Forum

Manthano

Member

Registered: 2024-12-20

Posts: 3

Laptop power management and lid switch options

What are all the places where power management and lid switch options can be controlled? It seems almost every laptop behaves differently with same settings, so I'm asking this as a general "these are the places"-list, but in particular I have this ThinkPad X1 Carbon 3rd Gen, that I can't get to respect not logging out when closing lid on AC power. Everything else works as expected.

I know that settings can be changed from:

Xfce Settings GUI

xfconf (xfconf-query)

UPower.conf

After failing with these configs, I've tried also following directly with xfconf-query with no effect:

xfconf-query -c xfce4-power-manager -p /xfce4-power-manager/logind-handle-lid-switch -s false

xfconf-query -c xfce4-power-manager -n -t 'bool' -p /xfce4-power-manager/logind-handle-lid-switch -s false

Some said compositor could cause lid switch problems, so:

xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/use_compositing -s false

But still Xfce logs me out if I close the lid while on AC power.

My Xfce version is 4.18.

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,652

Re: Laptop power management and lid switch options

If you set:

xfconf-query -c xfce4-power-manager -p /xfce4-power-manager/logind-handle-lid-switch -s true

...then the lid settings in /etc/systemd/logind.conf (on a systemd system) will also be processed.

But still Xfce logs me out if I close the lid while on AC power.

Can we see the output of the following?

xfce4-power-manager --dump
xfconf-query -c xfce4-power-manager -lv

In Settings > Power Manager > System tab, there are options on what to do when the laptop lid is closed and a toggle at the top of that dialog for "on battery" and "plugged in" - make sure you change the lid action for both scenarios.

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Manthano

Member

Registered: 2024-12-20

Posts: 3

Re: Laptop power management and lid switch options

Amazing. This is one of these moments...I swear I selected "Switch off display" in laptop lid closed menu in "System"-tab, but it was "Lock screen". Thank you, if you had not pointed out that most obvious settings place, I wouldn't have checked it again, because this is the first "set and forget"- setting I set in fresh install. Mea culpa!

But, this was a bonus solution, thank you again, I would still like to know how many different modifiers there are for power management, and furthermore, why do we have so many different places to set these things? And is there some priority for example UPower settings and xfconf?

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,652

Re: Laptop power management and lid switch options

The xfce4-power-manager settings are stored in xfconf - these are the main settings. By default, this should be the only ones you need to change.

However, there is an option to pass on control to systemd through the command I mentioned above. Upowerd configurations control upower which xfce4-power-manager uses so those could be relevant (Xfce can use or overwrite those settings). You can also manually script certain power management configurations (e.g. xset for display management, screensaver).

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Isabellasofia

Member

Registered: 2024-12-19

Posts: 2

Re: Laptop power management and lid switch options

This helped me too!!