unhammer's questions

If I use xdotool type "echo test string", whether directly in the terminal or through some other program, my keyboard is a bit laggy for two–three seconds afterwards. Why is this? Can I avoid it? (It also happens if I do complicated things like xdotool getwindowfocus windowfocus --sync type --clearmodifiers "echo test string".)

I don't know if xdotool is the culprit or there's something deeper, since I think some other situations also cause this lag, but this is at least a completely reproducible situation. I just don't know where to go from here in finding out what's happening :)

It also affects mouse clicks, not just typed characters. It's as if all input events are captured/ignored for a bit. In the video below, I start clicking on the other terminal right after hitting enter in the first terminal, clicking again and again until I see an effect:

This is a Thinkpad X270 with Xubuntu 20.04.4.

EDIT: Maybe I'm seeing https://github.com/jordansissel/xdotool/issues/367

On an HP Spectre x360, the F-keys are by default in the "Fn"-state, where they do fairly handy things like turn up/down volume or brightness. But F11-for-fullscreen and F2-for-renaming are really handy – is it possible to switch Fn-state for only certain keys? (I know I can switch for all keys in BIOS, but I'd like to keep the best of both states …).

(I'm using XFCE/Xubuntu.)

I notice Xubuntu can let me change the opacity of inactive windows, which seems nice for having small videos playing while showing my terminal below. But it quickly gets annoying when doing anything else – I don't want every inactive window transparent, and I'd rather not go into settings all the time to turn it off. Can I just set it for one window?

(Bonus points for turning it into a script that can both set transparancy, always-on-top, and remove window decorations)

Sometimes, after running an update, if I lock my screen and then try to log in again from the lightdm greeter, it goes black, sits for a while, then puts me back at the login screen.

Ubuntu gets stuck in a login loop talks about ~/.Xauthority or /tmp permissions, but those seem OK.

/var/log/lightdm/lightdm.log shows things like this:

[+330172.81s] DEBUG: Seat seat0: Session authenticated, running command
[+330172.81s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Running command /usr/lib/lightdm/lightdm-greeter-session /usr/sbin/unity-greeter
[+330172.81s] DEBUG: Creating shared data directory /var/lib/lightdm-data/lightdm
[+330172.81s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Logging to /var/log/lightdm/x-3-greeter.log
[+330197.83s] DEBUG: Activating VT 10
[+330197.92s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Greeter connected version=1.16.7 resettable=false
[+330222.99s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Greeter start authentication for unhammer
[+330222.99s] DEBUG: Session pid=21031: Started with service 'lightdm', username 'unhammer'
[+330222.99s] DEBUG: Session pid=21031: Got 1 message(s) from PAM
[+330222.99s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Prompt greeter with 1 message(s)



[+330258.19s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Continue authentication
[+330258.22s] DEBUG: Session pid=21031: Authentication complete with return value 0: Success
[+330258.22s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Authenticate result for user unhammer: Success
[+330258.23s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: User unhammer authorized
[+330258.23s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Greeter requests session xubuntu
[+330258.23s] DEBUG: Seat seat0: Returning to existing user session unhammer
[+330258.23s] DEBUG: Unlocking login1 session c44

[+330283.23s] WARNING: Error unlocking login1 session: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.TimedOut: Failed to activate service 'org.freedesktop.login1': timed out
[+330283.23s] DEBUG: Activating VT 9
[+330283.36s] DEBUG: Seat seat0: Stopping greeter
[+330283.36s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Sending SIGTERM
[+330283.36s] DEBUG: Activating login1 session c44
[+330308.37s] WARNING: Error activating login1 session: Timeout was reached
[+330308.37s] DEBUG: Session pid=20966: Exited with return value 0
[+330308.37s] DEBUG: Seat seat0: Session stopped
[+330308.37s] DEBUG: Seat seat0: Greeter stopped, running session
[+330308.37s] DEBUG: Registering session with bus path /org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Session11
[+330308.37s] CRITICAL: session_real_run: assertion '!session->priv->command_run' failed
[+330308.37s] DEBUG: Activating VT 10
[+330308.52s] DEBUG: Locking login1 session c44
[+330333.52s] WARNING: Error locking login1 session: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.TimedOut: Failed to activate service 'org.freedesktop.login1': timed out
[+330333.52s] DEBUG: Session pid=21031: Exited with return value 0

I've installed Xubuntu 15.04 on a Lenovo IdeaCentre A740 QHD with a Haswell CPU (BIOS revision 00KT19AUS) and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 850A 2GB. It's mostly working, except when I do a shutdown or reboot, it doesn't actually turn off the power after quitting everything:

So I have to click the power button to actually turn it off.

I've kept the Windows 8.1 installation in case there's any future firmware. Before installing Xubuntu, I turned off Fastboot from Windows, then installed Xubuntu. Unfortunately, the UEFI BIOS didn't let me change boot order so that Ubuntu actually started as default. I tried bcdedit /set {bootmgr} path \EFI\ubuntu\shimx64.efi, tried turning off "quickboot" (whatever that is) in BIOS, tried the Boot-Repair program from a Live Session, and tried turning off SecureBoot, but still it would just boot Windows. I ended up, with the help of EricC^^ of #ubuntu on freenode, just switching around the .efi files to trick the boot manager into thinking Ubuntu was Windows:

cp /boot/efi/efi/boot/bootx64.efi{,.backup}
cp /boot/efi/efi/microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi{,.backup}
cp /boot/efi/efi/ubuntu/grubx64.efi /boot/efi/efi/boot/bootx64.efi
cp /boot/efi/efi/ubuntu/grubx64.efi /boot/efi/efi/microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi
cp /boot/efi/efi/ubuntu/grubx64.efi /boot/efi/efi/microsoft/boot/grubx64.efi
sudo vim /usr/lib/os-probes/mounted/efi/20microsoft
# and changed bootmgfw.efi to bootmgfw.efi.backup
update-grub

I don't know if any of this has a bearing on the shutdown trouble.

EDIT: Come to think of it, the reboot from the Xubuntu installation (when I was booted through a USB drive) didn't work either.

What I've tried so far to get it to shut down:

• acpi=off → no difference
• acpi=force → no difference
• install proprietary Nvidia drivers → that just made X not start with the message "bbswitch: No discrete VGA device found"
• various variations on sudo poweroff, sudo shutdown now, sudo shutdown -h now etc.

Also, if I reboot instead of shutdown, I get this psychedelic lightshow on my monitor and have to long-click the power button to turn it off:

If it's helpful, here's a journalctl --all output right after booting up and perhaps even better: journalctl -b -1 (journal from bootup to shutdown).

Also, perhaps related, I notice now that pressing the power button while logged in to XFCE turns the computer right off, even though I have XFCE power settings to "Ask when power button pressed" and "Do nothing" on any other buttons.

My /etc/systemd/logind.conf has no uncommented lines apart from the [Login] header.

There is a /usr/sbin/acpid process running as root.

EDIT: More revelations: Ctrl+Alt+Delete actually reboot fine from GRUB.

EDIT2: I've filed a bug report since this doesn't seem fixable with the regular tricks.

EDIT3: Solved with acpi=noirq and kernel 4.4 and newer.

In Xubuntu's keyboard layout settings, if I choose "Bruk systemstandardene" (Use system standard) for my keyboard layout, I get the Norwegian "no" layout with deadkeys (same as setxkbmap no it seems). The key to the left of backspace gives me \, but with shift it gives a dead "`".

But if I want several keyboard layouts, there's only Norwegian without dead keys in the list (while e.g. Mac and Northern Saami variants both have with and without-versions):

Is this a bug? Where's Norwegian "no" with dead keys? It's obviously on my system since it's the system standard.

When I run GNOME (gtk3?) apps under Xfce, they get a double titlebar:

Is there any way to avoid this under Xfce?

I'm running Xubuntu 14.04.

I've got the ColorHug and it's got this nice LiveCD that runs Gnome and runs through a user-friendly monitor calibration program. Can I do this from Xubuntu, without booting into the LiveCD?

I'm using a raspberry pi as a NAS, serving video over SMB (sshfs made it skip too much, NFS I never got working). I prefer to watch movies with smplayer, from my Xubuntu laptop (opening the smb share in Thunar).

It works fine most of the time, but once in a while (not sure what causes it), smplayer will hang. I can quit the window, but the two smplayer processes still exist (one of them ), it won't start a new window, and kill (even kill -9) doesn't remove the processes. I can play the file with Parole, but the only way I can get smplayer to play it again is to reboot.

I'm guessing this means (s)mplayer is in 'uninterruptible sleep' due to some hickup with serving the file over the network, but how do I work around this? All networks have hickups some times, is there really a situation in Linux where the only solution is a reboot? EDIT: Seems like yes, if the parent process is 1, the only safe method is a reboot. But is there a way to stop it from going defunct in the first place?

I'm running Xubuntu raring with lightdm and xscreensaver. Both users on the system have xscreensaver set to lock the screen after n minutes. However, when I click "switch user" (or do gdmflexiserver --new), I have to enter the password first to lightdm, then to xscreensaver.

Since I can already do Ctrl+Alt+F7/F8 to avoid the lightdm password, shouldn't it be possible to avoid the password dialog for already logged in users? Xscreensaver will ask for the password anyway. Lightdm asking for a password that I can avoid seems like false security, while asking non-keyboard users to enter it twice is a hassle.

When I close the lid or type pm-suspend, I get a beep from my Thinkpad X220 running Xubuntu. How do I remove that beep?

It is louder if the volume is louder, so it's from the regular speakers (also, alsamixer has Beep muted and lsmod says I have neither snd_pcsp nor pcspkr loaded).

I think the beep came with an update some months ago.

Say I set my laptop to wake every morning with rtcwake (e.g. echo $(date +%s 'tomorrow 08:00') > /sys/class/rtc/rtc0/wakealarm in a cron job or in /etc/pm/sleep.d/99-set-alarm.sh).

Now, I'd like to run a script from /etc/pm/sleep.d/80-on-rtc-wake.sh only if the laptop was woken by the RTC alarm. Is it possible to check that the laptop was in fact woken by the RTC alarm?

I know I can read /sys/class/rtc/rtc0/wakealarm and it will be empty if the alarm is unset or alarm time has passed, but that leads to a race condition since I want to set the alarm for next morning.

Is there log or something that tells explicitly if the wake was caused by an rtc alarm?

My home server has an external USB drive connected. I prefer to keep it unmounted so I don't have to log in if I want to unplug it (for backup rotation).

But I'd also like to be able to browse it in Thunar from my laptop; I tend to do Ctrl+L and ssh://server/media/me/drive, it's very nice for copying pictures back and forth (which is not possible with ssh -X server thunar)

Is there a simple way to get Thunar, running locally, to make the server mount the drive?

I'm trying to use Ubuntu Backup (ie. DejaDup) with Owncloud. I have an account with Owncube and made a folder in my root called 'backup-computer1' where I want my backups to go.

Under Settings in Owncloud, it says

WebDAV: https://owncube.com/files/webdav.php

Then I went to Ubuntu settings, Backup, the Storage tab, and selected WebDAV from the dropdown list, and entered the following settings:

• Server: owncube.com/files/webdav.php
• tick "Use secure connection (HTTPS)"
• Port: 443
• Folder: /backup-computer1
• Username: myowncubeusername

but it keeps telling me it can't find the hostname. When I entered the full webdav address (https://owncube.com/files/webdav.php) it just removed it from the form. What am I doing wrong?

Where do I go when I'm using a non-Ubuntu computer and want to buy an album from the Ubuntu One Music store?

Running

echo "message:hi" | zenity --notification --listen

I can click the bubble and it disappears. The zenity program keeps running until I Ctrl-C. Is there a way to "catch" the click and make some program run if the bubble is clicked before it goes away?