getting XScreenSaver to come up when computer is idle

[Tom_ZeCat]

I've got Kubuntu 20.04 LTS installed, and it's nice and stable. Most everything works as I've intended. However, I haven't been able to get a random screensaver to come up when the system is not being used. In Muon I found a nice collection of screensavers named XScreenSaver. There were many in Muon named screensaver, and so I installed most of the ones I found in Muon. It includes a nice GUI as you can see in this screen shot. It lets you choose a specific screen saver to use or you can choose random, which is what I did.

However, the screen saver doesn't come up when I go away from my computer. I tried some settings to make it do it. I went to:
System Settings ==> Startup and Shutdown ==> Autostart
And then I made sure xscreensaver was there. It does run upon startup of the machine. It brings up the GUI that lets you choose if you want a random or a specific screen saver. However, I leave that on, but the screensaver does not come up when I haven't been using the PC. So then I went to:

System Settings ==> Workspace Behavior ==> Screen Locking
I unchecked these two things:
Automatically after 15 minutes
After waking from sleep

Next I tried installing this 3rd-party utility for controlling the startup and other things, one named Stacer. It shows xscreensaver in the auto startup area. But I just can't seem to get a random screensaver to come up from xscreensaver for when the PC is idle. I can run a screensaver preview from xscreensaver's GUI and the screensaver always comes up fine. I'm not sure what I'm missing. Any ideas?

[claydoh]

I did not disable anything in System Settings after installing this, just installed the package, set a timeout of one minute for testing, and it did run as expected, as long as I clicked 'ok' when prompted to start the daemon.


The screensaver daemon needs to be enabled, and simply adding xscreensaver to auto-start does not work in this case

First, try editing the autostart entry's command using the correct syntax:

xscreensaver -nosplash

If that does not work, Systemd to the rescue!
The last half of this page offers instruction that should work:

https://linuxhint.com/setup_screensaver_manjaro_linux/

After everything is set, make sure that XScreenSaver starts at startup.


Create a directory for storing the systemd service file of individual users (Just use dolphin of course, if you wish, of course) –

mkdir -p ~/.config/systemd/user/

Then, create “xscreensaver.service” file in the directory – (just use Kate/Kwite here of course):

gedit ~/.config/systemd/user/xscreensaver.service

Paste the following text into the file –

[Unit]
Description=XScreenSaver
[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/xscreensaver -nosplash
[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

Then, enable the service –

systemctl --user enable xscreensaver