Unable to unlock screen on xfce4

Help
1

Hello everyone.

I’m i3 using xfce4-screensaver:

  • Lightdm as display manager
  • xfce4-screensaver installed
  • xfce4-power-manager installed

Basically when the screen-saver gets triggered I see the screen saver but I’m unable to unlock the lock screen! Basically if I move the mouse or press a key I see the lock screen for half a second (I see that my input is registred in the password box) but after half second it returns to the screen saver! It’s so fast I can’t input my password…

Anyone have any clue on how to possibly fix this? Thanks

2

Anyone can help? I also tried installing the whole xfc4 system settings but not luck.

Maybe it’s related, but by installing xfc4 system settings on other distros I could see settings related to already installed packages, like xfce4 power manager or arandr… Now I get just an empty window

3

Hello again. Sorry for continuously posting but this is driving me crazy because I’m basically without a lockscreen. i3lock does not do it for me because it has an unresolved bug that when you wake from suspend the i3status bar is shown.

Please is someone able to advise on what to do? Thanks

4

…Still no guess… Someone can help please? Thanks

5

I know I’m spamming but it’s really important to me being able to have a proper lock screen… Someone can please help? Thank

6

Try setting security.pam.services.xfce4-screensaver.unixAuth = true; in your nixos config. (That’s what the xfce module sets)

My theory is that the screensaver is trying to initialize PAM to check your password, failing because it isn’t configured, and dropping out of the password entry mode.

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7

Using i3-lock I had to enable the program like programs.i3lock.enable = true; instead of just adding the package, due to some not-so-clearly outlined changed in 25.05. Maybe you need to do something similar?

8

That change didn’t do anything to xfce4-screensaver, but if I’m correct the underlying problem is similar.

9

Finally!!! Thanks. I wonder why this option is not available on NixOS Search. Wonder how you found it.

services.xserver.desktopManager.xfce.enableScreensaver = true; this was the thing I tried but it wasn’t working at all. Your solutions works good. Thanks so much.

Also I would love to understand why xfce.xfce4-settings does not pick up already isntalled programs like “xfce4-power-manager” or “arandr”, these gets picked up by it on arch without having the full xfce installed

10

security.pam.services is an option of type attribute set of (submodule). The xfce-screensaver part is just the attribute name, so it wouldn’t really show up in search. You could put any string there and it would be a valid option.

So the option search lists the leaf option used here as security.pam.services.<name>.unixAuth.

1 Like
11

Got it.

One last question if you will. I have installed xscreensaver which is a collection of screensavers that can be used by xfce-screensaver. Why when I select xscreensaver as an option from xfce-screensaver I just get a black screen? Is there a way to make it work?

Thanks

12

Not sure. I don’t know how xfce4-screensaver actually works in this regard. Better to ask someone who’s familiar with xfce specifically.

13

Where can I ask?

I think it’s because xfce4-screensaver tries to search for xscreensaver in the standard /bin/ folder, but being on nixos it does not find it. Same with xfce-preferences that does not find settings to apply.