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padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Screensaver not always starting automatically

Hi,

I've been having this issue for a while, the screensaver almost never starts automatically after the specified time (I left the default Q4OS Trinity values):

While digging for evidence in /var/log/syslog I found this line which made me raise my eyebrows:

2024-11-21T02:22:42.670308+01:00 scatorcio-di-merda xdg-desktop-por[14177]: Backend call failed: Impossibile invocare il metodo; il proxy è per un nome well-known org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver senza un proprietario e il proxy è stato costruito con il flag G_DBUS_PROXY_FLAGS_DO_NOT_AUTO_START

This is the literal English version of the aforementioned error:

xdg-desktop-por Backend call failed: Cannot invoke method; proxy is for the well-known name org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver without an owner, and proxy was constructed with the G_DBUS_PROXY_FLAGS_DO_NOT_AUTO_START flag

Googling around a bit I understood this has something to do with compiling options of a piece of software, probably the DBus Broker, but I'm not totally sure (still a bit a newbie on fiddling around with compiling software, in fact I never did), can anyone help in solving the issue?

There is one single instance where the screensaver starts working as expected: if I remote inside the PC with Anydesk from another machine then terminate the session, THEN the screensaver starts working normally, kicking in after 6 minutes as defined in the settings; still don't know how Anydesk triggers the screensaver to come on normally, tried to Google around but nothing; Anydesk version is 6.3.3 (latest available for Linux boxes).

Thanks in advance!

padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Hi,

can anyone help with this one?

Thanks

bin

Member

From: U.K.

Registered: 2016-01-28

Posts: 1,353

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Might be worth a look in TDEPowersave to see how you've got the screensaver/power management set in there.

padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Might be worth a look in TDEPowersave to see how you've got the screensaver/power management set in there.

These are my settings, I had to install TDEPowersave as it wasn't preinstalled:

On the other three settings, all the tick options are turned off, what is strange is that the PC is detected as if it was a laptop, notice the battery icon in the tray, this is strange.

bin

Member

From: U.K.

Registered: 2016-01-28

Posts: 1,353

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Don't worry about the icon - on my laptop it shows the mains power icon....

OK - select the Performance Scheme and check the top box to Enable Screen Saver and see what happens.

padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Ah ok, so basically the icon just shows whatever it wants ... Fine, I'll ignore it.

I ticked the top box in the Performance Tab, I'll report on how it behaves ASAP.

Thanks!

padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Hi bin,

I did as you told, unluckily it didn't do a thing .

The screensaver doesn't come on, and in syslog sometimes I still find:

xdg-desktop-por Backend call failed: Cannot invoke method; proxy is for the well-known name org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver without an owner, and proxy was constructed with the G_DBUS_PROXY_FLAGS_DO_NOT_AUTO_START flag

Do you have any other suggestions?

Thanks

bin

Member

From: U.K.

Registered: 2016-01-28

Posts: 1,353

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

This seems to be a fairly common issue. Do you have any flatpaks installed?

padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Eeehhhh... quite a lot it seems:

root@scatorcio-di-merda:~# flatpak list
Name                                      Application ID                          Version                     Branch         Installation
AnyDesk                                   com.anydesk.Anydesk                     6.3.3                       stable         system
Brave                                     com.brave.Browser                       1.70.126                    stable         system
Discord                                   com.discordapp.Discord                  0.0.71                      stable         system
Dropbox                                   com.dropbox.Client                      209.4.3661                  stable         system
Video Downloader                          com.github.unrud.VideoDownloader        0.12.18                     stable         system
Microsoft Edge                            com.microsoft.Edge                      129.0.2792.89-1             stable         system
Opera                                     com.opera.Opera                         114.0.5282.86               stable         system
Proton VPN                                com.protonvpn.www                       4.6.0                       stable         system
Skype                                     com.skype.Client                        8.127.0.200                 stable         system
Spotify                                   com.spotify.Client                      1.2.45.454.gc16ec9f6        stable         system
Vivaldi                                   com.vivaldi.Vivaldi                     6.9.3447.54                 stable         system
Freedesktop Platform                      org.freedesktop.Platform                freedesktop-sdk-23.08.23    23.08          system
Freedesktop Platform                      org.freedesktop.Platform                freedesktop-sdk-24.08.3     24.08          system
Mesa                                      org.freedesktop.Platform.GL.default     24.2.3                      23.08          system
Mesa (Extra)                              org.freedesktop.Platform.GL.default     24.2.3                      23.08-extra    system
Mesa                                      org.freedesktop.Platform.GL.default     24.2.4                      24.08          system
Mesa (Extra)                              org.freedesktop.Platform.GL.default     24.2.4                      24.08extra     system
ffmpeg-full                               org.freedesktop.Platform.ffmpeg-full                                23.08          system
openh264                                  org.freedesktop.Platform.openh264       2.1.0                       2.2.0          system
openh264                                  org.freedesktop.Platform.openh264       2.4.1                       2.4.1          system
GNOME Application Platform version 46     org.gnome.Platform                                                  46             system
GNOME Application Platform version 47     org.gnome.Platform                                                  47             system
PPSSPP                                    org.ppsspp.PPSSPP                       1.17.1                      stable         system
Zoom                                      us.zoom.Zoom                            6.2.3.2056                  stable         system
root@scatorcio-di-merda:~#

I installed many of them for testing them "when I'll find the time" which, until now, I didn't find...

Anydesk is the only program really useful to me, living without it will be impossible to me ATM.

The two GNOME Application Platform packages were installed when I installed Snap, which I had to install to test Whatsapp on Linux (I removed it later).

freedesktop, ffmpeg, mesa and openh264 are probably system packages.

The rest is part of the test stuff, I can remove them if I need to.

Regards

bin

Member

From: U.K.

Registered: 2016-01-28

Posts: 1,353

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

OK - that is the root of the issue (I think) - the org.freedesktop.Platform.

There are various discussions around xdg-desktop-portal org.freedesktop and the error message you are seeing. In essence I think it is saying that those two do not seem to get on with trinity screensaver as it doesn't know how to talk to them.

I've set up TDE on a laptop and the default screensaver works as expected.

I then install flatpak

robin@acer:~/Desktop$ sudo apt install flatpak
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
The following additional packages will be installed:
  bubblewrap libappstream4 libmalcontent-0-0 libostree-1-1 libpipewire-0.3-0
  libpipewire-0.3-common libspa-0.2-modules libstemmer0d libxmlb2 libyaml-0-2
  p11-kit p11-kit-modules xdg-dbus-proxy xdg-desktop-portal
  xdg-desktop-portal-gtk
Suggested packages:
  malcontent-gui pipewire accountsservice evince xdg-desktop-portal-gnome
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  bubblewrap flatpak libappstream4 libmalcontent-0-0 libostree-1-1
  libpipewire-0.3-0 libpipewire-0.3-common libspa-0.2-modules libstemmer0d
  libxmlb2 libyaml-0-2 p11-kit p11-kit-modules xdg-dbus-proxy
  xdg-desktop-portal xdg-desktop-portal-gtk



Setting up libpipewire-0.3-common (0.3.65-3+deb12u1) ...
Setting up bubblewrap (0.8.0-2+deb12u1) ...
Setting up libyaml-0-2:amd64 (0.2.5-1) ...
Setting up libxmlb2:amd64 (0.3.10-2) ...
Setting up libostree-1-1:amd64 (2022.7-2+deb12u1) ...
Setting up p11-kit-modules:amd64 (0.24.1-2) ...
Setting up libspa-0.2-modules:amd64 (0.3.65-3+deb12u1) ...
Setting up libpipewire-0.3-0:amd64 (0.3.65-3+deb12u1) ...
Setting up xdg-dbus-proxy (0.1.4-3) ...
Setting up libstemmer0d:amd64 (2.2.0-2) ...
Setting up p11-kit (0.24.1-2) ...
Setting up libmalcontent-0-0:amd64 (0.11.0-4) ...
Setting up xdg-desktop-portal (1.16.0-2) ...
Created symlink /etc/systemd/user/graphical-session-pre.target.wants/xdg-desktop-portal-rewrite-launchers.service → /usr/lib/systemd/user/xdg-desktop-portal-rewrite-launchers.service.
Setting up libappstream4:amd64 (0.16.1-2) ...
Setting up flatpak (1.14.10-1~deb12u1) ...
Setting up xdg-desktop-portal-gtk (1.14.1-1) ...
Processing triggers for libc-bin (2.36-9+deb12u9) ...
Processing triggers for man-db (2.11.2-2) ...
Processing triggers for dbus (1.14.10-1~deb12u1) ...
Processing triggers for mailcap (3.70+nmu1) ...
Processing triggers for desktop-file-utils (0.26-1) ...

and we can see  components mentioned in the error message being installed.

After reboot screensaver is still fine.

Just thinking - Anydesk is from what I see just another remote desktop tool. Now, I do recall many years ago doing some remote work on a machine on a different continent - and the screensaver kicked in.......... could not get past it so had to wait until the user got up to get back in - which by then was the middle of the night for me. With that in mind, it would make sense for Anydesk to kill off a screensaver on a remote machine - does it do the same thing for the 'client' machine?

Last edited by bin (2024-12-16 14:58)

padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

Hi bin,

sorry for the late reply, as always life gets in the middle but luckily I'm on holidays now , and as always I can't thank you enough for the help you're giving me.

Anydesk could well be the cause at this point... as I already stated before, if I remote inside the PC with Anydesk from another machine then terminate the session, then the screensaver starts working normally, BUT I forgot to also mention that, sometimes, if I remote inside the PC a second time after logging off, when the screensaver is on, I can move the mouse and it disappears, only to reappear after a second or two; I can get past it, but after logging inside the machine, standing still with the mouse or keyboard for more than a second or two makes the screensaver kick back in, and the session gets locked again; this sudden and continuous appearance and disappearance of the screensaver, other than the fact it makes working on the machine a PITA, sometimes makes Anydesk himself hang, and I cannot remotely access the PC anymore until i get back home and restart the Anydesk service directly on the PC.

Nothing of the above happens remoting inside a Windows or Mac host, so I highly suspect the latest version for Linux hosts, being quite old and unmaintained for a long time, is the culprit of this issue; I'm removing it right now, at least on this test PC, and I'll keep you updated on how it evolves; I hope removing it will solve this issue, and if this is the case, I'll find a better alternative; in fact, I already found it in NoMachine, which also transmits audio from the PC (something that Anydesk should be doing fine, like it does for Windows Hosts, but it doesn't, and reading the Anydesk forum on the matter it seems the Linux application is broken and not maintained from the devs at Anydesk ), but NoMachine is not allowed from my workplace sadly (it works but as soon as I make a connection, I receive a warning email that it's been detected), and it also cannot transfer files between Linux and Windows even if it should, probably I'll contact the guys at the NoMachine forum for this issue.

Edit 1: Anydesk doesn't cause issues on the client machine (Windows, but I also tested between my two Q4OS PCs and I don't recall it causing this issue on the client machine), I'll do some more tests to confirm it anyways.

Edit 2: so should I remove xdg-desktop-portal org.freedesktop straight away? If I try removing it from the "Package Manager" application, it also requires me to remove "xdg-desktop-portal-gtk", is that ok?

Again, TY for your support.

Last edited by padota1663 (2024-12-21 19:10)

bin

Member

From: U.K.

Registered: 2016-01-28

Posts: 1,353

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

No problem - not sure if we're making progress but we'll keep trying

Back in the day I always used remmina with a vpn to connect to windows machines which had remote desktop enabled. The version in the debian repo is not too far behind but the latest is available as a flatpak.

As regards xdg-portal, it is a recommended package, not a dependency of flatpak. So, in theory one could remove it. However it does provide a number of services to sandboxed flatpak applications and I honestly cannot suggest how they would be impacted as the org.freedesktop.Platform service may well start complaining.

https://people.freedesktop.org/~hadess/ … /re01.html is useful as it does mention that the service you are seeing in the log is responsible for screensaver inhibiting, but again it is probably not a case of simply trying to remove it. It seems that one or more application is triggering that service - if you look lower down that page you'll see an example.

This would suggest that one or more of those flatpak programs is trying to do just that. It may be PPSSPP as I guess having a screensaver cut in during a game may be bad...there are just too many variables here.

I think if I were in your shoes I think I would be setting up on a spare machine and slowly installing and testing until I got to the point where it malfunctions.

padota1663

Member

Registered: 2024-09-21

Posts: 23

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

I did some testing in those days, between my two Q4OS PCs (which are test PCs to me ATM, not "production" PCs) and a Windows laptop, these are the outcomings:

- as soon as you log in to a session the screensaver doesn't start on its own after 6 minutes as it should
- if I connect with anydesk to one of the machines, then the screensaver is enabled, both with the anydesk session still active and once it is terminated
- if after the anydesk session I go into menu k --> control center --> peripherals --> display --> on the energy control tab and I enable energy control (which is normally deactivated), press apply, then deactivate it and press again apply, then the screensaver stops working again
- the screensaver stops working again if I log out of the user session and then log back in, or if I turn off / restart the PC
- sometimes, after logging in with anydesk and terminating the session, you can no longer lock the desktop, either from the k menu or by right-clicking on the desktop and choosing "lock session", or even by pressing ctrl-alt-del (which normally locks the desktop, at any time and with any window open); you need to log out and log in, or turn off / restart your PC to make the screen lock work again
- when the screensaver works normally, activating within 6 minutes, and I start playing a video on YouTube with Firefox or playing a video using VLC Media Player, the video playback is not detected and the screensaver activates; if the screensaver does not work regularly, it is obviously not activated during video playback
- anydesk does not cause the same effect of "enabling screensaver" on the "client" PC that makes the connection, but only on the "server" PC which receives the connection; this is hardware independent, i.e. if I terminate the connection from PC A to PC B and I start a reverse connection (and so, their roles as "client" and "server are reversed), then the screensaver will start working also on PC A
- stopping the anydesk service and disabling it on a PC on which the screensaver does not run has no effect; even reenabling and restarting the service has no effect (the screensaver still does not start automatically)

Regarding your mention of Remmina, I considered going plain VNC or RDP but I went with Anydesk for a series of motivations (not blocked or detected at my workplace, has mobile app **both client and server**, does not need tinkering with network devices to open ports as it uses online relays, supports sound transmission **not working on Linux ATM, dunno why** and file transfer, supports 2FA and connecting IDs whitelist); a colleague of mine suggested me ZeroTier as an alternative, probably I'll check it out (it creates a kind of **Wide Area VPN** with up to 10 devices inside for the free version); Teamviewer is out of question, they cut your connection after a certain amount of time for free use and are more aggressive at detecting commercial use; having always been less fond of it, and less comfortable in using it, I never checked if it supports anything Anydesk does, when I used it for a short time before Anydesk.

As regards xdg-portal, I think I'm leaving it alone, at least for now and after reading what you said (and finding it absolutely correct), as I suspect too that things can break if I remove it.

I also read the link you posted: https://people.freedesktop.org/~hadess/ … /re01.html but I have to admit that sometimes I find this kind of manpages for Linux softwares (not the "classical" manpages which detail every option of a specific command) uncomprehensible and hard to interpret; what commands do I have to impart to the terminal to check what software is preventing the screensaver to come on? Or what config files should I modify to do it? Can you help me understandng a bit more please? Or is the page just a guide for developers which have to implement the function inside their pieces of code (seems like so, to me)? Sorry again but I've never been able to interpret this kind of "cryptical manpages".

I don't know if the screensaver doesn't come on because of some flatpak packages (you mentioned PPSSPP which, ATM, I never used), I say this because I installed a ton of them from the "suggested ones" in the Q4OS software center just to test them "when I have time and will" I think in September, but I had this issue since May when I started using Q4OS, I cannot recall if it started happening right from the start or since I installed Anydesk, because I installed it almost immediately.

If you read my tests list above and think of some other test to suggest doing with Anydesk, let me know, as ATM nothing else comes to mind.

Cheers

Last edited by padota1663 (Today 02:22)

bin

Member

From: U.K.

Registered: 2016-01-28

Posts: 1,353

Re: Screensaver not always starting automatically

I can see you've been busy. However I think it comes back to my suggestion that you start with a fresh test system. Get it running without any additional software and satisfy yourself that the screensaver works as expected.

Make sure you have the power settings correct for DPMS interaction with the screensaver. I do not know if hardware differences are likely to be involved here - for example if one machine has an intel graphics and one has nvidia then they will be using different drivers. I think it unlikely or this type of problem would have arisen before.

The possible source of the issue is flatpak, so initially I suggest you proceed without it.

Since you seem to have established a reproducible process for making it 'go wrong' I would then install Anydesk using the deb file they provide. It is 6.4 which seems to be the same as the flatpak version but without the extra baggage. See if you can repeat the issue. I've had a quick look at the debian package and there does not seem to be anything within the installation that interferes with the screensaver, and I imagine you have already looked at all the possible settings - if any - that the application provides.

Can you repeat the issues?

Last edited by bin (Today 08:53)