GUYS… I´d love to report at least something good: It´s spring soon!
Well, and here´s just another smaller problem that I´ve been experiencing lately: After not touching my computer for more than 20 minutes (by that time my screensaver did already pop in), I can´t UNLOCK my screen.
Now to clarify that point: It´s probably not an issue with the screenaver. I tested letting pop up the screensaver, moving mouse - everything back to normal. But after a longer period of time, the screen locks (everything keeps working in background) and the mentioned error message pops up. The only way to get back to the dektop is to either reboot or manually switching to runlevel 3 and later on to runlevel 5 again.
AWESOME. Any help is (as always) much appreciated, guys.
Since you didn’t say which desktop manager you are using, it is kind of hard to diagnose. Also, I’m not sure if you want it to not lock at all, or to fix it so that unlocking works.
For the sake of doing something constructive, I am going to assume you are using KDE4 with automatic login, and you want the locking turned off. If you are looking for something different, reply back.
The locking by default does not start immediately when the screen saver starts, it waits a minute or so just in case you are there, not active on the screen, but don’t want it to lock. To turn off this behavior, click on the K-menu->Configure Desktop, then under Look & Feel, select Desktop-> Screen Saver. At the bottom here will be an option that says “Require password to stop”. If you uncheck this, locking will be disabled.
If you want the locking to happen, but want to fix it so your password works, it sounds like you are probably just entering your password wrong. To test, select log-out, and try logging back in, if this works with the same password you are trying with the unlocking, you may have a much more serious problem.
Note that if you are using KDE3 or Gnome, there should be a similar way to disable the locking.
I am currently using KDE 4.1.3 without automatic login (means username as well as passoword must be typed).
Now as I said before: I don´t consider this to be an issue with the screensaver…
Well, to clarify: The password option is NOT set. First ahead, the screensaver appears. Way later (10 to 20 minutes) the screen first turns off its light (screensaver running in the background). Then it completely blacks out - and by that time its locked. Now if I move the mouse, the mentioned error message appears while the screensaver is shown in the background.
Well, I have two more ideas. But first, are you saying you get the error without ever actually typing your password? Meaning, immediately after moving the mouse it errors. That may mean you have a much bigger problem. With that said, try the below to see if it helps.
I think it may be the power management that is causing it then. Try going to K Menu-> Configure Desktop, choosing the Advanced tab, then selecting power management. Under General settings there should be an option that says “Lock screen on resume”. Try unchecking this box and see if that fixes it.
A more permanent and drastic solution is to rename the desktop locking program. I haven’t tested this under KDE4, but I have done it in KDE3 (for a bunch of student lab machines where we wanted locking disabled completely). Just do
Thanks for your suggestion… apparently it didn’t work.
Any other hints I might try? THANK YOU so much for supporting me guys - my experience in this forum has been just great.
Actually its the thread title. It tells me the message in german, but I assume it is about the same in english.
Unlocking Sceen - unlocking the screen failed.
As I said before: i don´t have the password option set. But why does the screen lock anyway?And in the background everything runs perfectly (even the screensaver is happy)…
Although I don’t really know what the above code did - it did NOT work.
Now if I’d try your second code, will I be able to enable it some day again by just renaming the file again to ‘krunner_lock’? If so, I’ll try that one.
Yes, renaming it back will just make it work again. I guess I incorrectly called it permanent. All the OS does is when it tries to lock the session, it calls krunner_lock. Since it is no longer under that name, it will just silently fail (you may get an error message in /var/log/messages or someplace else, but nothing will show up on screen).
Also, the ln -s command just creates a symbolic link called the second name towards the first one. It is similar to a “shortcut” in Windows.
Thanks elserj, “sudo mv /opt/kde3/bin/kdesktop_lock /opt/kde3/bin/kdesktop_lock.orig” just solved the first problem - the session is not locking anymore at all.
Unfortunately another sad side-effect arised from that: My screensaver won’t initialize anymore. If there is a solution for that one, everything would be just fine.
Oh and I almost forgot: With execution of the above command I am not able to restrict access for others to my computer anymore, right? There MUST be a way to tell the computer manually to turn of locking or turning it on…
I’m not sure on your first problem here. But you should be able to manually lock the computer by just calling the renamed executable, ie. kdesktop_lock.orig. It should even be in the path, so you can just do Alt+f2 and type kdesktop_lock.orig in the box that pops up. That should lock it, however, you probably still won’t be able to unlock it due to your original problem.
True. What I want here is a CONSTANT fix. I’d likle to show you my problem - is there a better way than timing the snapshot with ksnapshot up to 99 seconds? I’d need to set another timeframe…
Arrgh… why the heck does it LOCK without prompting for a password? Is there a way to take a timed snapshot of the screen?
I´d like to show you this crap - and solving it is essential for working with SUSE. I can´t do a hard-reset on my drives every time the screen locks!
Are you saying that even after you moved the kdesktop_lock file, it still locks on you? Or you just want the screensaver to work and disable the locking? If this is the case, you may try installing xscreensaver and see if it works any better for you. I believe you can just install xscreensaver and it will show up in the KDE4 display settings.
Also, you never answered if using the root password unlocked it.
As far as taking a timed snapshot, you can try using Gimp. File->Create->Snapshot. You can enter a time here. To make it larger than 100, you will have to manually type it in. However, I don’t know if this will work because if the screen is locked during the snapshot, how can you save the file?
You can also try a video recording of your desktop (screencast) using something like recordmydesktop (it’s in the repos). But again, I’m not sure how to save the file if it is locked.
However, if it were me, I would probably do one of 3 things.
Keep the kdesktop_lock file renamed and live without a screensave.
Use Yast to do a force reinstall of everything, or
Reinstall from scratch, which I hate doing and suggesting because it is such a MS way of solving issues. But your problem is definitely not normal and should not occur on a stock installation.
Ok, I’ll make this quick as it is almost 2 o’clock over here…
First of all: NO - after moving kdesktop_lock, the screen does NOT lock anymore. There certainly doesn’t appear a screensaver either.
2nd: I am NOT prompted for any password. the pormpt just tells me that unlocking the session failed.
3rd: Screenshot & video probably won’t work that way. i’d appreaciate further ideas though.
Guys… I don´t know whats going on here, but driving me crazy. When letting the computer sit for half an hour, the session is locked and it FAILS to unlock.
I BADLY NEED A SOLUTION (deleting/moving kdesktop_lock WON´T help, cause it´s there after EVERY update).
Have you tried rebuiding your .kde4 folder. It’s not elegant, you’d have to reconfigure all KDE apps, but as far as I can see, the above mentioned are no real solutions for you either. To do so:
Logout, hit Ctrl-Alt-F1, login as root and do:
mkdir /home/yourusername/OLDKDE
mv /home/yourusername/.kde* /home/yourusername/OLDKDE
Now login again and KDE will rebuild the users .kde* folders and files. If the problem persists there is something wrong with your install
