Xfce Forum

guayaseal

Member

Registered: 2022-07-14

Posts: 17

screensaver

According to Arch documentation ( https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xfce#Lock_the_screen ):

xflock4 is the reference Shell script which is used to lock an Xfce session.

It tries to lock the screen with either xfce4-screensaver (also part of xfce4-goodies), xscreensaver or light-locker. It consecutively looks for the corresponding binary or exits with return code 1 if it fails to find any of these.

Well. I have this script. I have xscreensaver installed. For the lock screen to work I need to start it first manually (or by entering screensaver's configuration) but I doesn't start via applet/action buttons/etc by default.

What I'm missing? How can I debug it?

(BTW: on one of my notebooks I works, on two others - doesn't; my colleagues experience the same problem...)

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,791

Re: screensaver

The screensaver daemon must be running. Is it in your autostart list and enabled?

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guayaseal

Member

Registered: 2022-07-14

Posts: 17

Re: screensaver

Could you, please, say more precisely: what "autostart list" do you mean?

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,791

Re: screensaver

Settings Manager > Session and Startup > Autostart Applications. This lists all the applications/programs that start when you login. Check to see if xscreensaver is listed there and whether its enabled.

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guayaseal

Member

Registered: 2022-07-14

Posts: 17

Re: screensaver

If I do it manually then it works. But take a look at the fragment of the documentation I have pasted in the first post.

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,791

Re: screensaver

Yes, for this to work, the screensaver of choice must be running its daemon (listening service) so to initiate the screensaver action - just like when you run it manually. If you don't want to have to run it manually first, then you can autostart the daemon at log in so that xflock4 will work later on. To do so, you would either enable or create an entry in the Autostart Applications dialog.

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guayaseal

Member

Registered: 2022-07-14

Posts: 17

Re: screensaver

How about enabling it by default for all users (existing and newly created)?

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,791

Re: screensaver

That would be something that the xscreensaver package should do. It could be accomplished simply by placing a .desktop file in /etc/xdg/autostart or creating a systemd user unit.

Have you tried xfce4-screensaver? It is more integrated and a part of Xfce.

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guayaseal

Member

Registered: 2022-07-14

Posts: 17

Re: screensaver

I have copied:

# cp /usr/share/applications/xscreensaver.desktop /etc/xdg/autostart/

and added "--no-splash" option to it and it works perfectly fine for my home computers. But it hasn't resolved the problem on the computers at work. Why?

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,791

Re: screensaver

Which distro are you using at work? Some distros use different xdg directory locations.

echo $XDG_CONFIG_DIRS

Is there an entry in Settings Manager > Session and Startup > Application startup for xscreensaver and is it enabled?

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