Re: Lock Screen in menu only works when screensaver is configured.

["Mike A. Harris" <mharris www linux org uk>]

On Tue, 13 Jul 2004, psychoelmo wrote:

>Date: Tue, 13 Jul 2004 21:17:23 -0600
>From: psychoelmo <psychoelmo gmail com>
>To: Discussions about development for the Fedora desktop
>    <fedora-desktop-list redhat com>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
>Reply-To: Discussions about development for the Fedora desktop
>    <fedora-desktop-list redhat com>
>X-BeenThere: fedora-desktop-list redhat com
>Subject: Re: Lock Screen in menu only works when screensaver is configured.
>
>i can understand you not wanting a screen saver to kick in.. but
>afaik, that's what locks the screen.. can you set the screensaver
>timeout really high and just use blank-screen for the saver?  at least
>then the screen wont blank unless it sits, say, overnight or
>something, a cpu hog screensaver wont run, and you still have the
>ability to lock the screen at the touch of a button.. that's what i do
>here. might work for you until something else comes along.

One problem with making a blank screen the default screensaver, 
is that there are many users out there who for whatever reason, 
just wont realize this is happening, and might think their 
machine has locked up or crashed or something and hit reset or 
poweroff, thus trashing their session.  If only they had moved 
the mouse or hit a key they'd know it was just a blank screen.  
I've even done this myself absent mindedly a few times at the 
console on a rarely used machine.

The default screensaver definitely should not be "random" IMHO, 
but it also shouldn't just be "blank".  I believe the default 
Microsoft Windows screensaver is a Windows logo that randomly 
moves around the screen every n seconds.  It's pretty basic and 
boring, but it does the job, and also lets the user know it is a 
screensaver and not a locked up machine.  ;o)

We should create a "Fedora Logo" screensaver and make that the 
default.  One of the xscreensaver savers is probably close enough 
to use as a basis for derivative work.  If not, it would probably 
be only a few hours to hack up a basic screensaver of this nature 
with minimal effort.

Sound sensible?