Screensaver and VNC

[Don Christensen]

All,

Apologies if this has been discussed before...

I recently loaded Ubuntu Feisty (7.04) on a machine where I was
previously using Redhat EL 4.x, so I was finally able to upgrade
from Xfce 4.2.x to 4.4.0.  I've noticed a few issues that weren't
there before.  Hopefully these aren't Ubuntu-packaging issues.

The issue that bothers me the most right now is the screensaver
config.  I run a vncserver (tightvnc 1.2.9) on this machine on
display :2.  I start Xfce there using the following script:

     #!/bin/sh
     xrdb $HOME/.Xdefaults
     xsetroot -solid "#080060"

     export XDG_CONFIG_HOME=/users/djc/.config2
     export XDG_CACHE_HOME=/users/djc/.cache2
     unset  SESSION_MANAGER
     startxfce4 & ;;

Panel configs and such all work just fine, and do not conflict
with the settings for my console desktop (which is dual-head
but not Xinerama, but I think that's irrelevant for this issue).
However, the screensaver config is shared between the VNC server
and the console X server.  In other words, if I change the
settings in the VNC session, they are reflected in the main
console session.  I would like to be able to turn off the
screensaver in the VNC session but keep it enabled in the
console session.  This used to work just fine with 4.2.x.

Another problem I have is with the VMware window.  VMware has
some weird cursor grabbing behavior, but the behavior under
4.4.0 is worse than under 4.2.x.  With 4.2.x, the VMware
window would keep ownership of the cursor when I moved it out
of the VMware window, so I would have to click in a non-VMware
window to get focus there.  otherwise, cursor behavior is normal.

With 4.4.0, whenever the cursor leaves the VMware window, it
warps to 0,0 on the screen (I run the VMware window typically
on screen :0.1).  This gets quite annoying when I'm trying to
get near the bottom edge of Windows in the VMware window and I
overshoot a little.  The cursor ends up at the top left of the
screen.  Oddly, I no longer have to click to get focus into a
non-VMware window anymore, though.

I have also seen some odd dual-head behavior.  When
I bring up the settings manager on :0.1 and click on Sound,
the Sound window shows up on :0.0.  Screensaver, Preferred
Applications, File Manager, and Display do the same thing,
but the others are okay.  Also, Desktop comes up in the correct
screen, but clicking the Behavior tab and clicking Edit Menu
brings up the window on the wrong screen (:0.0).

Finally, I've created an Xfce Menu applet in my panel that
uses a custom menu file.  However, when I click on Edit Menu,
it takes me to the default menu to edit, not my custom menu.

I haven't been keeping up closely with the list for the last
few months, so I may have missed discussions on any of these.
If they are fixed in 4.4.1, I would appreciate pointers to
repositories for 4.4.1 packages suitable for Ubuntu Feisty.

Issues not-withstanding, thanks for the work on Xfce.  The
main reason I switched from RHEL4 to Ubuntu Feisty was to
get newer gtk2 libs that would allow me to run Xfce 4.4.x,
and I'm generally quite happy that I did.  I was starting
to feel left-out being stuck at 4.2.x.  :-)

Thanks,
-Don

-- 
Don Christensen       Senior Software Development Engineer
djc at cisco.com         Cisco Systems             Austin, TX
   "It was a new day yesterday, but it's an old day now."