the inconvenience of Swtiching Monitor Screens on KDE / Plasma

English Hardware
1

As much as I love the plasma kde desktop, I find that, compared to other DE’s, working with multiple monitors and projectors is a nightmare.

On MATE or XFCE I can easily switch or extend monitors and predict the outcome as well using shortcut keys. On GNOME the display options are immediately available by right click on the desktop.

On Plasma 5 this is not easy. For such an “advanced” desktop to have overlooked work on making this functionality easy seems a serious oversight.

I need to work with more than one monitor and be able to switch between them easily. but the display utility does not seem to be reliable in remember monitor configurations. It does not even remember where to put panels properly. Assigning one screen as the primary monitor does not guarantee where the main panel will appear. I have installed Plasma 5 on several computers from scratch using Tumbleweed and Leap. The result is the same.

If I am seriously overlooking something and this can be explained I would be grateful to hear it. Also publishing it clearly would be wise as I have met other engineers with the same frustrating experience…
Plasma 5 would be my preferred desktop if this issue could be resolved. I don’t want to have to go through loops and also empty my kscreen directory every time I have new customers.

2

On Mon 26 Sep 2016 04:06:01 PM CDT, johnoshock wrote:

As much as I love the plasma kde desktop, I find that, compared to other
DE’s, working with multiple monitors and projectors is a nightmare.

On MATE or XFCE I can easily switch or extend monitors and predict the
outcome as well using shortcut keys. On GNOME the display options are
immediately available by right click on the desktop.

On Plasma 5 this is not easy. For such and “advanced” desktop, to have
overlooked work on making this functionality easy seems a serious
oversight.

I need to work with more than one monitor and be able to switch between
them easily. but the display utility does not seem to be reliable in
remember monitor configurations. It does not even remember where to put
panels properly. Assigning one screen as the primary monitor does not
guarantee where the main panel will appear. I have installed Plasma 5 on
several computers from scratch using Tumbleweed and Leap. The result is
the same.

If I am seriously overlooking something and this can be explained I
would be grateful to hear it. Also publishing it clearly would be wise
as I have met other engineers with the same frustrating experience…
Plasma 5 would be my preferred desktop if this issue could be resolved.
I don’t want to have to go through loops and also empty my kscreen
directory every time I have new customers.

Hi
Maybe monitors.xml is not being created or overwritten or not read by
plasma?


cat ~/.config/monitors.xml

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3

if I dot that I get this:

john@linux-sn3k:~> cat ~/.config/monitors.xml
<monitors version="1">
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMI1">
      <vendor>ACI</vendor>
      <product>0x0000</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1920</width>
      <height>1080</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP1">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMIA40">
      <vendor>ACI</vendor>
      <product>0x0000</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1920</width>
      <height>1080</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP32">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMI1">
      <vendor>ACI</vendor>
      <product>VX228</product>
      <serial>E8LMRS002220</serial>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP1">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1366</width>
      <height>768</height>
      <rate>60.015983581542969</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMIA40">
      <vendor>ACR</vendor>
      <product>0x0000</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>800</width>
      <height>600</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>168</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>no</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP32">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1366</width>
      <height>768</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>800</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMI1">
      <vendor>ACR</vendor>
      <product>P1173</product>
      <serial>JH5110018400</serial>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP1">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1366</width>
      <height>768</height>
      <rate>60.015983581542969</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMI1">
      <vendor>SAM</vendor>
      <product>0x0000</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1920</width>
      <height>1080</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>no</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP1">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1366</width>
      <height>768</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>308</x>
      <y>1080</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMI-1">
      <vendor>ACI</vendor>
      <product>VX228</product>
      <serial>E8LMRS002220</serial>
      <width>1920</width>
      <height>1080</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP-1">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="eDP1">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
    </output>
    <output name="HDMI1">
      <vendor>ACI</vendor>
      <product>0x22c1</product>
      <serial>0x01010101</serial>
      <width>1920</width>
      <height>1080</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
  </configuration>
  <configuration>
    <clone>no</clone>
    <output name="HDMI1">
      <vendor>ACR</vendor>
      <product>0x0000</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>800</width>
      <height>600</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>322</x>
      <y>0</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>no</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
    <output name="eDP1">
      <vendor>AUO</vendor>
      <product>0x40ec</product>
      <serial>0x00000000</serial>
      <width>1366</width>
      <height>768</height>
      <rate>60</rate>
      <x>0</x>
      <y>600</y>
      <rotation>normal</rotation>
      <reflect_x>no</reflect_x>
      <reflect_y>no</reflect_y>
      <primary>yes</primary>
      <presentation>no</presentation>
      <underscanning>no</underscanning>
    </output>
  </configuration>
</monitors>
4

Hi
If you move the file out of the directory temporarily, logout/login does it get re-created? If you create a test user using plasma does it duplicate?

5

no it doesn’t get re-created