no 'Settings' button in gnome-screensaver

[George]

There is no settings button in gnome-screensaver, thus I am unable to change the settings for any screensaver.

Note: this bug is marked, upstream, as "won't fix." Here is the given explanation why: http://live.gnome.org/GnomeScreensaver/FrequentlyAskedQuestions#head-64ef29e28226e09a3b849d8f00726cc004625c62

[Till (tillm)]

I have to agree, we need some way to configure options for savers that are
configurable such a GLtext, Carousel. What's the point of these savers otherwise?

[Emmanuel Rodriguez (potyl)]

The lack of settings for some screen savers makes them less appealing, specially the ones that operate on pictures like GLSlideshow.
Please consider providing some basic configuration to the screen savers.

[Emmanuel Touzery (emmanuel-touzery)]

upstream rejected it WONTFIX:
http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=316654

[François Tissandier (baloo)]

Ubuntu's philosophy is to offer a OS in as many languages as possible. Gnome Screensaver is not fitting with this philosophy, as you have to put your images in a "Pictures" directory if you want them to be displayed by the slideshow screensaver. I'm french, I don't have a "Pictures" directory, I have a "photos" one. A spanish user will have "fotos".

I'm OK to have simple applications, but it just simply doesn't work...

[Wouter Stomp (wouterstomp-deactivatedaccount)]

I think Ubuntu should deviate from upstream here and provide an options button (hopefully this will be done in time for dapper).

[GonzO (gonzo)]

I think Ubuntu should stick to hacking Xscreensaver if upstream is going to be this way. Gnome-Screensaver looks nice, but is simply so inadequate to the task at hand that it is effectively broken.

[Kristoffer Lundén (kristoffer-lunden)]

Agreed. We need to be able to change settings of screensavers, for many reasons: language/text, file locations and also performance reasons.

[Lukas Sabota (punkrockguy318)]

Most of the screensavers are useless without configuration. Would it be difficult to take the settings code from Xscreensaver and put it into Gnomescreensaver?

[Scott Robinson (scott-ubuntu)]

Language/text issues are totally different than this bug. If you want that issue to be addressed, I suggest opening a new report.

[IbeeX (ibrkanac)]

Why do developer need to invent "new features" in this example feature is again less is better, but this feature (no setup for screensavers) is hurting usability off screensaver, why did they even included changing off screensavers if less is better why not joust Off and ON? Actually I think that sometimes less is much worse. So put back screensaver configurations.

[Rafał Próchniak (burlap)]

And there are screensavers that grab your desktop (or any other image): lack of settings option leaves them with "control picture" (see for example "slider"), which is 1. confusing, 2. far from professional. If we want to oversimplify, my suggestion is to preconfigure configurable screensavers (grabbing desktop image for example, this is probably what most of the users expect anyway)
(power users that can replace gnome-screensaver with xscreensaver anyway)

And still, leave at least an option to enable/disable specific screensavers - not only GL screensavers are resource-eating (Distort is one of the examples)

[Oliver Grawert (ogra)]

no, grabbing the desktop by default is evil behavior and considered a security flaw by many people, thats why ther last changes were made to xscreensaver-data and xscreensaver-gl, the image handling is already solved, please see the changelogs

[LKRaider (paul-eipper)]

I agree, the lack of configuration is a major usability bug.
I would consider gnome-screensaver not ready for release as it is.

[Peter de Kraker (peterdekraker)]

I agree too, This is not acceptable for a screensaver manager. Considering the non-constructive attitude of the gnome-screensaver developer, we should really make this a big point as ubuntu users.
I don't think it's a good idea to start our own development, but we should really get this working before dapper releases. It is a severe issue: For 'simple' users screensavers are a major joy and have indeed relevance for a enjoyable ubuntu experience.

[Daniel Holbach (dholbach)]

Upstream bug is rejected. Upstream author points to http://live.gnome.org/GnomeScreensaver/FrequentlyAskedQuestions

[James Jones (jamesjones01)]

The current behavior of gnome-screensaver is inconsistent with the rest of GNOME 2.14, which gives the system administrator control over what the user can do with pessulus and sabayon. gnome-screensaver wires in the bare minimum: the user can either not have a screensaver at all, have the screen blank out, pick one particular screensaver, or let gnome-screensaver choose at random, with no control whatsoever over the set from which the selection occurs.

If the sysadmin is supposed to have control, then gnome-screensaver should give it to him or her. For many of us, we are the sysadmins, and our computers are at home, but gnome-screensaver takes control away from us!

[essexman (ralphsmail)]

At the very least this should be an administrator choice. Maybe the administrator has the option to give individual user configuration. This would certainly be wanted where I work and it would cause me no issues at home.

[joehill (joseph-hill)]

I really think a fork is in order here. I've heard dozens of people agreeing that this philosophy (as Linus says "interface Nazis") is wrong, but only a couple fanatics who say "you crybabies, real men don't even need GUIs, much less stupid screensavers or the right to choose how many cows they want bouncing on their screen! Just use Windows or KDE if you need configuration options!"

If you don't like options, don't use them. Maybe have an option to disable them. But I see no point in removing options just because someone has realized in a zen moment that options are for losers.

I think most users are going to uninstall the "debian-desktop" package that depends on this package and install the xscreen-savers and not care about dbus and all that stuff.

[darx (rabidphage)]

I'm a bioinformatics student and i've been planning to depend on the molecule screensaver to view and memorize 3d structures. What is the use of a screensaver without configuration options???
Is there any hack to get around this????????

[George (george-alink)]

install xscreensaver and remove gnome screensaver

cheers,

george

On 14 Apr 2006, at 22:26, darx wrote:

> I'm a bioinformatics student and i've been planning to depend on
> the molecule screensaver to view and memorize 3d structures. What
> is the use of a screensaver without configuration options???
> Is there any hack to get around this????????
> --
> no 'Settings' button in gnome-screensaver
> https://launchpad.net/malone/bugs/22007

[Oliver Grawert (ogra)]

you can edit the /usr/share/gnome-screensaver/themes/molecule.desktop
file (add the wanted commandline parameters to the Exec= option)

even upstream wont get around to provide a gui option to adjust the screensaver settings, its just not implemented yet. some people subscribed to that bug should calm their wording here or provide a patch, just ranting wont solve it.

[Conrad Knauer (atheoi)]

At 2006-04-14 21:50:05 UTC George wrote: "install xscreensaver and remove gnome screensaver"

In Dapper, gnome-screensaver is a dependency of ubuntu-desktop and so it cannot be uninstalled without consequenses. Right now I have both installed; this is a sub-optimal solution.

I would recommend that the Ubuntu developers either make their own reduced version of xscreensaver or transplant this feature into Ubuntu's version of gnome-screensaver.

As it exists now, gnome-screensaver is oversimplified to the point of being barely usable.

[Conrad Knauer (atheoi)]

I just checked https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DapperReleaseSchedule and we're into FeatureFreeze already, so its too late to modify these packages... As an alternative suggestion that would satisfy the requirements of those wanting to adjust their screensavers, could the ubuntu-desktop metapackage be slightly modified changing:

Depends: gnome-screensaver

to this:

Depends: gnome-screensaver | xscreensaver

(thus allowing one or the other)

[Elijah Lofgren (elijahlofgren)]

"could the ubuntu-desktop metapackage be slightly modified changing:

Depends: gnome-screensaver

to this:

Depends: gnome-screensaver | xscreensaver"

This sounds like the best solution at this point. Ship gnome-screensaver by default, but let people replace it with xscreensaver if they want configuration options. :)

Should I change this bug to be against ubuntu-desktup?

[Oliver Grawert (ogra)]

this has nothing to do with the bug at all, if you want file a separate bug, but since our metapackages dont work that way, i doubt we can do it anyway. note also that xscreensaver was sceduled to be demoted to universe and in fact is only in main as a xubuntu dependency.

[Oliver Grawert (ogra)]

sorry, that was meant to be: if you want file a separate bug, feel free to do so.

[Conrad Knauer (atheoi)]

Oliver Grawert wrote: "this has nothing to do with the bug at all"

As far as getting a good work-around until this bug is resolved, yes, it does :)

"our metapackages dont work that way, i doubt we can do it anyway"

??? AFAIK, any debian package can have "or" requirements; consider apache2 which according to Synaptic:

Depends: apache2-mpm-worker (=2.0.55-4) | apache2-mpm-prefork (= 2.0.55-4) | apache2-mpm-perchild (= 2.0.55-4)

"note also that xscreensaver was sceduled to be demoted to universe and in fact is only in main as a xubuntu dependency"

Well, its nice and convenient that it hasn't been demoted yet, so that the change to ubuntu-desktop can be made ;)

Also might I suggest that xscreensaver shouldn't be demoted until after this bug is fixed :)

I will file a bug on ubuntu-desktop momentarily.

[Conrad Knauer (atheoi)]

I filed the suggested ubuntu-desktop change as Bug #42668

[Oliver Grawert (ogra)]

thanks for that, you can belive me if i say that neither our seeds nor the metapackages built from them support "or" dependencys, there are workarounds (see totem).

your proposal has nothing to do with adding the settings management for the hacks to gnome-screensaver and simply doesnt belong in this bug.

[Ryan Rawdon (flieslikeabrick)]

I must add my two cents to this and say that it is a huge disappointment that the screensavers configuration isn't present. Many screensavers are pointless without the configuration/settings, and many of the possible settings for the screensavers are what make them interesting at all in the first place.

Please bring this back :-( I miss the utility that was in breezy for settings/screensavers

[Conrad Knauer (atheoi)]

A comment was added to Bug #34276 (a duplicate of this bug) by Bobby Feagin that should be added here as no one has mentioned it yet:

---
Another issue with the new gnome-screensaver. I always use the random screensaver mode, but now I can't pick which screensavers I want enabled. There are several installed screensavers that I don't like or cause problems, and I don't want them included in the random rotation. Since these are bundled together in packages, I can't uninstall the ones I don't like without hacking source code. Much less user friendly than giving us simple configuration options.
---

This is not really a separate issue however; when "Random" is selected, clicking a Settings button should bring up a box to specifically allow you to choose which screensavers you want.

[Jordan (jordanu)]

The developer on bugzilla stated "Also, unless you are motivated enough to actually write some code or pay/convince someone else to do it for you then you are less likely to get what you want."

I don't really know how this sort of thing works, but I will pitch in $40 to get real functionality in gnome-screensaver ( I would help code but I don't consider myself a good enough programmer yet ), if that is what is needed to motivate somebody to fork or fix this problem. Anybody else willing to contribute? Is this just a stupid idea?

[gerard (zzking)]

Yes that's an idea, but what I don't understand is this step back,
because in Breezy we were able to select whatever screensaver we wanted???

Jordan a écrit :
> The developer on bugzilla stated "Also, unless you are motivated enough
> to actually write some code or pay/convince someone else to do it for
> you then you are less likely to get what you want."
>
> I don't really know how this sort of thing works, but I will pitch in
> $40 to get real functionality in gnome-screensaver ( I would help code
> but I don't consider myself a good enough programmer yet ), if that is
> what is needed to motivate somebody to fork or fix this problem. Anybody
> else willing to contribute? Is this just a stupid idea?
>
>

[Computer Geek (kibmcz)]

At least allow gnome-screensaver to be removed seperate of ubuntu-desktop... then i could install xscreensaver and use that instead.

[Ryan Rawdon (flieslikeabrick)]

ubuntu-desktop is just a meta-package, removing it will not break your system

On 8/11/06, Computer Geek <email address hidden> wrote:
> At least allow gnome-screensaver to be removed seperate of ubuntu-
> desktop... then i could install xscreensaver and use that instead.
>
> --
> no 'Settings' button in gnome-screensaver
> https://launchpad.net/bugs/22007
>

--
Ryan Rawdon
Computer and Systems Engineering, IT
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute '08

[Jordan (jordanu)]

"Most of the screensavers are useless without configuration. Would it be difficult to take the settings code from Xscreensaver and put it into Gnomescreensaver"

No, in fact I have made a program that lets you change your screensaver settings in xscreensaver and then updates the corrosponding gnome-screensaver .desktop files accordingly.

That way you get the functionality of xscreensaver while still being able to use gnome power-management. The main problems with it are

1: That it requires root privaleges to edit the .desktop files
2: That it cannot save seperate settings for separate accounts
3: It is written in java because that is all I currently know, and is poorly programmed because I was trying to get it done quickly and frankly I am not an experienced programmer.

So we could concievably keep xscreensaver-demo while still using gnome-screensaver, but it is a dirty hack in my opinion

If anyone want's to use this or make their own version of it here are the files.

http://trogdoor.googlepages.com/ConfigSaver.java (source )
http://trogdoor.googlepages.com/ConfigSaver.class ( application )
http://trogdoor.googlepages.com/ConfigSaver ( script that just starts xscreensaver-demo then runs configsaver when xscreensaver-demo is closed )

[kresp0 (kresp0)]

I'll pay another 40$ for to get real functionality in gnome-screensaver.

[5of0 (cincodenada+ubuntu)]

As a relatively new Ubuntu user, I am befuddled as to why this is even an issue. As has been stated time and time again, many (if not most) screensavers are useless without config options.
I need to be able to configure how many cows, what my text says, what pictures to show...it's stupid to say that obviously, GNOME users would rather muddle around with config files than have a GUI. I like to call myself a geek, but I'm not opposed to a GUI - If it's so obvious that config files are the way to go, why even have gnome-screensaver? Why not just have the user find a list of screensavers and specify that in a config file? And why even have GNOME? Obviously, it would be better just to do everything from terminal, since we are so opposed to GUI's.
It's ridiculous. If I read the way-above linked FAQ...I have to create or find a whole theme to change my preferences? Ugh! If this is typical, I see why Torvalds was so anti-GNOME (http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/12/13/1340215). When I first read that, I thought "that's crazy. No one could be that stupid." Well...I'd say, if Windoze XP (drives me nuts because I can't configure anything) has the option for something, GNOME can definitely support it.

[xfx (morphx-gmail)]

I'm working on a full substitution for the gnome-screensaver-preferences application. It still has some bugs and it cannot yet manage the screensaver's daemon specific features but it will let you tweak your screensavers' settings.

http://software.xfx.net/ftp/xfx-screensaver-settings_0.1.tar.gz

Comments and suggestions are welcomed.

[kresp0 (kresp0)]

Please, can you give the sources?

Thank you for your work,

[Carey (sqrfolkdnc-gsb)]

Modern monitors don't suffer burn, and nearly all computer monitors are "green" and set to automatically power down anyway, so perhaps the screen saver should be removed completely (other than the stub that shuts off power)

In these times, screen savers are no more than a passive game, they serve no useful or needed function.

If the developers will affirm their automobiles came from the dealer with all the radio stations preset and cannot be changed, I will accept that the screen savers not be non configurable. I would prefer no radio to preset stations.

If the developers will affirm that the web browser they use came with preset favorites that cannot be changed, then I will accept that the screen savers not be configurable. I would prefer no favorites to unchangeable ones.

If the developers will affirm that in the next release of Ubuntu, all the games will have fixed options, and can only be played in one way, then I will accept that the screen savers not be configurable. I would prefer...you get the drift.

If the developers of Ubuntu will lock down the directory tree so that users cannot create any new sub-directories, then I will accept that the screen savers not be configurable.

If the developers of ubuntu wish to position Ubuntu as a serious business operating system, they must eliminate all games from the installation, and remove all installable games packages. As long as games are included and others can easily be installed, then configuration for screensavers should be available. The screensaver is no different than a game. Note that if configurability has to be installed as an add-on package, business don't allow users to install software, so it will be non-configurable to them.

Carey Schug

[mac (amartin83)]

The reason why they didn't make this for so long time is either they don't want us to use Ubuntu (shame) or they don't know how to do this (which seems to be simple), or they have no time (5 years [first post 2005] may be not enough for them :D ). Or they just simply pis.. at us (shame again).

[Brian (x-brian)]

Please, someone either fix this of fix that:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/indicator-session/+bug/528094

This is a significant user interface bug in my opinion, and the alternative (xscreensaver) suffers from a bug as well. I'd personally prefer to have xscreensaver called properly from the session menu and just ignore the gnome idiocy.

[Carlos Manuel Pires (cmpsalvestrini-gmail)]

This is moronic. Screensavers are supposed to be configurable. Period. Fix the damn screensaver applet.

[Sam Liddicott (sam-liddicott)]

Relax. They (upstream) have a fix - of course!

This bug has been marked as a secret show-case bug for some MS fan-boi (or Ballmer on his swan song) to pull out as evidence as to how kack "linux" (Gnome) is because you can't even configure your screen-saver.

As soon as that happens, the patch will be applied to steal away the thunder and undermine MS marketing strategy.

This big is also part of the strategy for bug #1 https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/1

All this is obvious (and I shouldn't have to explain it) if you read between-the-lines here: http://live.gnome.org/GnomeScreensaver/FrequentlyAskedQuestions#head-64ef29e28226e09a3b849d8f00726cc004625c62

And realize that most of the reasons given are pretty much dumb reasons that only appeal to powerful entities who need help controlling their serfs and in no way relate to giving competent power over their own operating system.

Once you realise that, it all makes perfect sense!

[Brian (x-brian)]

Marc, are you saying now that Ubuntu won't fix this either? I know the Gnome people/person has his head up his @$$ on this, but now Canonical has joined him up there? I understand this is not high priority (though it should be if Ubuntu ever wants to compete with Windows/MacOS), but it is definitely a bug that should be fixed. Especially when replacing with xscreensaver doesn't work fully:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/indicator-session/+bug/528094

Personally, I put up with the above bug rather than the completely useless gnome-screensaver. In fact, if xscreensaver caused my computer to burst into flames every time it activated, I'd still use it before using gnome-screensaver, on principle.

[Danté (dante-ashton)]

Listen, I'm really, REALLY sorry if the GNOME 'Vision' conflicts with reality. But this is reality, and the vision must fit into it; we have many screensavers that REQUIRE configuration; like the dozens of picture screensavers.. How about RSS screensavers? Sure, equip them with a certain feed, but to many people, we don't LIKE the default feed. Nor can we change it. Do you have any idea how sick I am of many of the picture screen-savers just loading the same series of Space photos?

This really is just silly. I'm all for not-confusing-the-user but I'm NOT too keen on frustrating them, either.

[Marc Deslauriers (mdeslaur)]

I see two photo screensavers. The first one is called F-Spot photos and uses the "Favorites" tag in F-Spot. The second one is called "Pictures folder" and simply displays the pictures it finds in your ~/Pictures directory. Seriously, what's to configure? If you want a different picture directory, just put a symlink in ~/Pictures.

What is this "RSS Screensaver" you are talking about?

[Carlos Manuel Pires (cmpsalvestrini-gmail)]

I think the inability to set the preferences in a screensaver is shortsighted at best. Efforts should be made to discard the "won't fix" upstream and, perhaps, develop an in-house tweak to add the missing functionality. I won't comment on the Gnome team's reasons for crippling the functionality because IMHO they are to put it mildly, bozotic, nearsighted and ridiculous.

[Carlos Manuel Pires (cmpsalvestrini-gmail)]

This bug was marked WONTFIX by the maintainer. I suggest alternatives be found, since the original maintainer no longer cares about gnome-screensaver and has an absolutist philosophy about screensaver preferences.

[Danté (dante-ashton)]

There are many, many screensavers in the Ubuntu repo, and many more on various websites. An example of an RSS Screensaver is FontGlide, Noseguy, Phospher....seriously, there are loads.

So what if I don't want to have my pictures folder as a basis for the screensaver? What if I would like to only show a subdirectory? Setting up a symlink is not intutive. Grasping for a clearly defined configuration panel is, I'd wager.

[Carlos Manuel Pires (cmpsalvestrini-gmail)]

"Modern monitors don't suffer burn, and nearly all computer monitors are "green" and set to automatically power down anyway, so perhaps the screen saver should be removed completely (other than the stub that shuts off power)

In these times, screen savers are no more than a passive game, they serve no useful or needed function.

If the developers will affirm their automobiles came from the dealer with all the radio stations preset and cannot be changed, I will accept that the screen savers not be non configurable. I would prefer no radio to preset stations.

If the developers will affirm that the web browser they use came with preset favorites that cannot be changed, then I will accept that the screen savers not be configurable. I would prefer no favorites to unchangeable ones.

If the developers will affirm that in the next release of Ubuntu, all the games will have fixed options, and can only be played in one way, then I will accept that the screen savers not be configurable. I would prefer...you get the drift.

If the developers of Ubuntu will lock down the directory tree so that users cannot create any new sub-directories, then I will accept that the screen savers not be configurable.

If the developers of ubuntu wish to position Ubuntu as a serious business operating system, they must eliminate all games from the installation, and remove all installable games packages. As long as games are included and others can easily be installed, then configuration for screensavers should be available. The screensaver is no different than a game. Note that if configurability has to be installed as an add-on package, business don't allow users to install software, so it will be non-configurable to them.

Carey Schug"

I agree with 99% of what Carey said.

[Carlos Manuel Pires (cmpsalvestrini-gmail)]

"I don't have any plans to support this. My view is that any screensaver theme
that requires configuration is inherently broken."

As said by the original gnome-screensaver maintainer... In 2006. IMHO this person has some serious control issues.

[Danté (dante-ashton)]

Screensavers are mainly a passive activity, yes. I happen to be in love with the Eletric Sheep screensaver, if only because I find it hypnotising.

Schools and other educational institutions around me are still using the old CRT monitors. As such, I would argue agaisn't the removal of screensavers.

[cablop (cablop)]

Won't fix?

Why... hey, that's just to bring back the old button that launched the settings config of each screensaver...

No matter what a few people believe, some screensavers have settings to configure, some people love screensavers, i do!

But we want to keep freedom to choose how our screensavers will work.

I wanted to use that GL slideshow one, but to a custom folder, i don't want to show all my pictures collection, just a subset of it... and it's too sad to realize Gnome is unwilling to give us the freedom to choose...

[Brian (x-brian)]

https://help.launchpad.net/Bugs/Statuses
Won't Fix: this is acknowledged as a genuine bug but the project has no plans to fix it.

It is unclear whether this means "we don't have time for this" or if it means "don't even bother submitting a fix, you'll just be wasting your time."

I think I will have to look carefully at Fedora, since so many professional software packages are designed for Red Hat and Fedora is similar. Heck, maybe I'll just go with Red Hat. It must be better than Oracle Enterprise Linux--I can't imagine how it could be worse! It's a big pain in my rear to set everything up the way I need/want, but the earlier I switch the less painful I guess.

[Sam Liddicott (sam-liddicott)]

  On 31/08/10 15:32, Marc Deslauriers wrote:
> I see two photo screensavers. The first one is called F-Spot photos and
> uses the "Favorites" tag in F-Spot. The second one is called "Pictures
> folder" and simply displays the pictures it finds in your ~/Pictures
> directory. Seriously, what's to configure? If you want a different
> picture directory, just put a symlink in ~/Pictures.

I used to use photo-screensaver when I could configure it to spend only
1 second per photo.
Now I don't use a screen-saver because I don't like the dozens of
seconds it spends per photo.

[cablop (cablop)]

Seroiusly, Gnome is suffering of some sort of anorexia.
The project wanted to remove and declutter itself.
And that's ok.
But then, when it is ok, it started to cut more and more of itself. We say, hey Gnome, you are cute that way! but Gnome keeps telling, i'm still fat...
We need options. Simple options, yes, but options. We can't be forced to use something that is mostly an aestethic thing nowadays if we cannot setup it to suit OUR sense of aesthetics.

Also, Marc... is simpliciy, the kind of simplicity Gnome is looking for, to tell us to go down and edit the code of an screensaver? from my point of view that's not simple... and your answer was rude... something like "I'm not willing to code that, so go yourself and deal with the barebones of it"...

In my opinion... if you are not willing to enhance the user experience... why not to give this project to somebody else?

[Brian (x-brian)]

With the bug listed as "Won't Fix" this bug report does not show up in the list of open bugs under gnome-screensaver any more. You have to click "Advanced search" and choose to display "Won't Fix" bugs to see it.

Only 10 bugs that haven't had a fix released have more users affected (including "invalid" bugs)

Only 1 bug has more comments, only 5 have more duplicates, and only 10 have more heat. This is out of 636 bugs that aren't marked "Fix Released."

It seems this is a real concern among many Ubuntu/Gnome users, and something should be done about it.

Since Marc changed this bug to "Won't fix" the only comment we've seen from him actually included, "Seriously, what's to configure?" Those of us using xscreensaver get to see the wonderful configuration options for not only the slide show screen savers, but all the rest as well. If you install a more robust collection of screensavers, there will be much more to configure. Why not just completely remove all of them and use nothing but blank screen? With blank screen, there is certainly nothing to configure, so that would solve this bug I guess. If anyone wanted to use a computer with this strange 1980's-era technology of "Screen Savers" they could just install a real app like xscreensaver.

[zcat (zcat)]

Back when I first started running Ubuntu the screensavers _WERE_ configurable.

So was the login window.

I could choose what application ran when I inserted a DVD, eg have it run dvd:rip rather than the small number of programs that Ubuntu has deemed an acceptable 'player' for DVDs.

I could configure dial-up networking, and it worked on all the ISP's I ever needed to use it with.

It's not just this bug, but this bug is one glaring example of the whole problem.

This obsession with "removing" all of the configurability is driving people away from Ubuntu. You're perpetuating the myth (by making it not a myth at all) that either Linux is greatly inferior to Windows because it has so fewer options, or that nothing useful can be done in Linux without resorting to a terminal.

Please. Fix this BUG.

[Sam Liddicott (sam-liddicott)]

I think it needs a little more publicity. Perhaps on http://blogs.msdn.com/ or New York Times technology pages (they've not published much on GNU/Linux since 2009).

"You're too smart for Linux if you can configure a screen-saver" is a suitable headline.

[Sam Liddicott (sam-liddicott)]

Maybe the Ubuntu bug is that Ubuntu ships Gnome-screensaver at all.

[cablop (cablop)]

I agree, the bug is to have that screensaver manager and not a better one

[Sam Liddicott (sam-liddicott)]

I've filed a new bug 634108 (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/634108) suggesting that gnome-screensaver be deprecated and replaced with xscreensaver.

[James M. Roche (paedomorphosis)]

Five years... Thank you, Gnome, for protecting us from the terrifying complexity of having options, and the potential difficulty of attempting to use software that has actual functionality. Where would we be without you to protect us from our own foolishness?

This whole situation is preposterous. It makes me glad Ubuntu is moving away from Gnome. Please Ubuntu devs, make a functional Unity screensaver chooser to replace the entirely useless gnome-screensaver!

[xfx (morphx-gmail)]

@James: I understand your frustration -- that's why I'm still maintaining the screen-saver settings application: http://whenimbored.xfx.net/2011/05/i-want-my-screensaver-settings/
Although not a solution, it is at least a workaround...

[James M. Roche (paedomorphosis)]

Oh yeah, thanks for making to effort to do something instead of just complaining like the rest of us! :) I downloaded the deb, but I'm using 64-bit... I guess I should download the tarball and compile, etc?

[Brian (x-brian)]

@xfx: the last time I had looked at screensaver-settings, it wasn't working for the current release of Ubuntu--I'm glad it seems to be in development. This should get into the repository; is there any way to get this into the Canonical repository?

[xfx (morphx-gmail)]

@James: I don't see why the 32bit version shouldn't work under 64bit Ubuntu. I guess I will have to download it and test it...
But, before I do, could you please download the binary package (http://whenimbored.xfx.net/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/download.php?id=8) and see if it works?
To test it, simply launch the program by executing "mono screensaver-settings.exe" from a terminal.

[Carey Schug (sqrfolkdnc)]

Reading the wikipedia article about the unity desktop makes me wonder if I should be looking for a new distro to run. Sounds like more choices are being taken away.

[Brian (x-brian)]

@xfx: I just tried to run the 32-bit screensaver-settings.exe on 64-bit Ubuntu 10.10, and it failed.

[xfx (morphx-gmail)]

@Brian & @James: Ok. I will download Ubuntu 64bit now and run some tests but, please, let's try to keep any bug reports relating to screensaver-settings out of this forum.
You can continue post your bug reports, comments and suggestions on my personal blog: http://whenimbored.xfx.net/2011/05/i-want-my-screensaver-settings/ or through the official web site: http://xfx.net/ss.htm?redir=sss.

[xfx (morphx-gmail)]

@Brian & @James: Please download the binary and see if this one corrects the problem under x64: http://software.xfx.net/ftp/screensaver-settings-bin.tar.gz

Please, remember not to post bugs/comments regarding screensaver-settings here. I don't the admins/mods would like that.

[Sam Liddicott (sam-liddicott)]

Perhaps there should be a "talk" section associated with each bug in launchpad, which could hold the meta-conversation?

[xfx (morphx-gmail)]

Is there any experienced packager that could take a look at the new x86/x64 DEB packages I created for version 0.3.4 and let me know if they need some modifications/additions in order to be considered for addition into the Debian repository?

The latest version of the .deb packages can be downloaded from this page (at the bottom): http://whenimbored.xfx.net/2011/05/i-want-my-screensaver-settings/

[Brian (x-brian)]

@xfx:

This seems to work partially for me on:
$ uname -srvmo
Linux 2.6.35-30-generic #59-Ubuntu SMP Tue Aug 30 19:00:03 UTC 2011 x86_64 GNU/Linux

(Maverick Meerkat)

I have gnome-screensaver installed, and I also had to install gnome-desktop-sharp2 after seeing an error referencing "gnomedesktop-sharp" when I tried to run screensaver-settings from the terminal. Once I installed gnome-desktop-sharp2 I was able to start screensaver-settings from the terminal and the GUI interface seemed to work fully.

However, I set the time to activate the screensaver to "1" (minute?) and did not see the screensaver activate. I tried both with and without gnome-screensaver installed. Did not try with xscreensaver installed. Also, the interface did not seem to get the cycle delay for randomly chosen screensavers to stick. I have not done a reboot or log out/in. Got work to do, can't interrupt that.

For now I am going back to xscreensaver, but thanks for the work you've done on this. I think getting Canonical to help might be tough because of Mono/C#. But certainly would be great to figure out what packages are required for this to work, and a quick overview of installation/use would help. I'd recommend setting up a vanilla VM under VirtualBox, for example, and seeing what has to be done to get this working correctly.

Of course this bug still wouldn't be solved since gnome-screensaver itself is forever completely broken, but at least there would be a workaround.

[era (era)]

Reverting apparently mistaken affects: change. If you really mean to assign this to Baltix, please explain why.

[Filippo Cattaneo (n1jpr)]

Is this set up on purpose to make GNU-Linux in general, and Gnome in particular, sociologically dysfunctional as to make Windows look better by comparison? And, yes, I _DO_ believe that this belongs in a technical discussion in a bug-tracking system.

[Chad Bernier (berniercr)]

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