(Almost) no Autostart mechanism works

cwellm · 2022-07-15 03:57:20

Dear community,

I am quite desperate regarding the configuration of autostart, since nothing seems to work. I started with bash scripts on login - that actually works, but I do a startx command there, and apparently all scripts are executed in the same thread (or process), and startx cannot run in the background, so I cannot add something there.

So I tried the xinit starter script. My actual goal is to set the screensaver time via xset (xset -dpms and xset s whateverIWant). But nothing happens. I did that before the last command which says exec startlxde.
The file is /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.

I thought that, maybe, this gets overwritten by some higher level process like openbox or the server is not yet started, so I tried the autostart of openbox (and, for that matter, openbox-lxde, since I have LXDE).
This does not work either. For testing purposes I tried to start some other program like lxterminal or krita, but also: Nothing happens.
The procedure follows the description given in https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/autostarting (Openbox Autostart and LXDE Autostart).

Yes, I also have Gnome additionally installed, so maybe this overrides again the xset setting, but at least, applications should start when in autostart, right? Or what do I not see?

Thanks in advance

seth · 2022-07-15 07:16:13

lxde seems to rely on xscreensaver?
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/XScree … g_settings

Did you check "xset q" on whether the settings where applied.

For testing purposes I tried to start some other program like lxterminal or krita, but also: Nothing happens.
The procedure follows the description given in https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/autostarting (Openbox Autostart and LXDE Autostart).

Don't paraphrase. Post the actual things you did (eg. LXDE seems to implement XDG and executes some home-made script which seems to have some peculiarities)

Your bashrc is btw. the absolutely wrong location for any of this, startx would be in ~/.bash_profile and no X11 sepecific stuff belongs there.

cwellm · 2022-07-19 16:11:35

Thank you for the hints, @seth. I'll check again and will post more precisely, if the problem persists.

Why is bashrc the wrong place (if I want the script to execute for any login)?

cwellm · 2022-07-19 17:34:08

I may have found the solution. The gnome desktop comes with a plugin called "Energieverwaltung", which is actually another term for xfce4-power-manager. This seems to override everything - even if it is set to "off" in the gui! Even then it would overwrite xset settings, and also gsettings do not help to change that. When tweaking the sliders, indeed, one can change the desired xset settings (timeout, suspend, dpms, ...). It's sad that there seems to be no associated startup file :-/

seth · 2022-07-20 11:53:59

Why is bashrc the wrong place (if I want the script to execute for any login)?

bashrc is executed w/ every shell, not every login shell (so also whenever you open a terminal inside your GUI session) and any kind of (regular) bash login shell is going to be executed before the X11 server starts (so attempts to control that server will fail)

I don't think that *gnomes* power manager plugin is xfce4-power-manager - they'll end up doing the same but are very most likely different processes.
I'd however expect settings you make in gnomes power management config to be restored on your next login.

Arch Linux

#1 2022-07-15 03:57:20

(Almost) no Autostart mechanism works

#2 2022-07-15 07:16:13

Re: (Almost) no Autostart mechanism works

#3 2022-07-19 16:11:35

Re: (Almost) no Autostart mechanism works

#4 2022-07-19 17:34:08

Re: (Almost) no Autostart mechanism works

#5 2022-07-20 11:53:59

Re: (Almost) no Autostart mechanism works

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