In general, the KDE desktop seems to have some, uh, “issues”. Sometimes the panel on monitor 1 disappears altogether. On occasion, right-clicking on the main window to get to the “Activities…” menu item fails to pop up the Activity list. Every once in a while, switching to a different activity fails to load the wallpaper on one monitor, usually the right-hand one that I prefer to call monitor 2 but, well, read on…
Several times a day, seemingly at random, I’ve been finding that my dual monitor setup has monitor 1 (left) and monitor 2 (right) swap identities. Applications that I’ve configured to only appear on monitor 1 (via right-click->Special Window Settings) appear on monitor 2. Sometimes clicking on the main application launcher on the panel located on monitor 1 opens the application drop down menu on monitor 2. The panel I have setup on the edge of monitor 2 to hold the Activity switcher suddenly appears on what is supposed to be monitor 1 but KDE/Plasma probably now thinks is monitor 2. Audacious is supposed to display track information on monitor but winds up displaying it on monitor 2 despite my resetting it back to monitor 1 just the previous hour. Logging out and back in usually helps but not always. Jumping into the system settings and manually settings things to “normal” only fixes the problem for a little while.
This swapping misbehavior was once an occasional things but it’s happening several time/day now. I thought it might have been tied to using a screensaver and screen locking but I’ve disabled those and the monitor switches have not stopped.
Q1: What software component might be affecting the monitor arrangement?
Q2: In what config file are these settings saved?
(I’m thinking of writing something that’ll set/unset the immutable attribute on that config file to prevent changes from happening except when I want to make them… instead of whatever is swapping the monitor identities whenever I’m away at lunch, off at a meeting, etc… But I see that as something of a last resort if the process that’s making the changes cannot be tamed.)
What is output from inxi -Ga run in Konsole in Xorg session?
Complain upstream. You’re hardly the only one who has experienced multiple screen mismanagement by Plasma.
Disable KScreen2 in startup
Use another method to position screens
There are several other paths to positioning screens. ]Arandr will create a script to position screens. You can tie the script to startup and/or a hotkey combination.]Use xrandr in Konsole or xterm to position screens and designate the primary screen, where the main toolbar will appear. This script would differ little to none from one that arandr would create. It’s just that using xrandr directly would result in some educational effect. Either arandr’s script or your own can be put into global effect, so that it takes effect on your login screen instead of only after Plasma starts, and would also apply if you start some alternative DE session.]Configuration via /etc/X11/xorg.con. This is the hard way. Try everything else first.
I suspect it doesn’t much matter but inxi didn’t report anything about the monitors: two Asus VP280 (1920x1080), one driven via DisplayPort, the other HDMI.
Disable KScreen2 in startup
Not familiar with the bit of code. What’s it intended to do. I’m not seeing it as a running process so I assume it starts, does something, and leaves.
Where would I disable it?
… Use another method to position screens
There are several other paths to positioning screens.
Arandr will create a script to position screens. You can tie the script to startup and/or a hotkey combination.
Use xrandr in Konsole or xterm to position screens and designate the primary screen, where the main toolbar will appear. This script would differ little to none from one that arandr would create. It’s just that using xrandr directly would result in some educational effect. Either arandr’s script or your own can be put into global effect, so that it takes effect on your login screen instead of only after Plasma starts, and would also apply if you start some alternative DE session.
Configuration via /etc/X11/xorg.con*. This is the hard way. Try everything else first.
I not averse to any of the above… even The Hard Way provided I can find readable documentation. I’ll do some searching for a little leisure reading.
I found “kscreen-doctor” in /usr/bin which, without any arguments, produces comparable output to what xrandr shows (though the output is garishly colored for some reason). So maybe there’s a fourth path.