Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Changing Gnome-Screensaver Background on Lubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric)

I had to find a way on Lubuntu flavoured LXDE to lock/unlock the current running desktop session. The obvious easy way is to use xscreensaver and/or gnome-screensaver and do one of the following:
xscreensaver-command -lock
gnome-screensaver-command --lock
I chose to keep with gnome-screensaver since it is prettier. But immediate annoyance was after locking screen, gnome-screensaver would not retain the same background as current Lubuntu session. After trying so many options (gconf, editing files in /etc), finally I figured - the solution is rather easy.

It appears Lubutu session keeps a separate sets of options from LXDE. When gnome-screensaver is launched, it takes the background option of LXDE (not Lubuntu). To match same background both on LXDE and Lubuntu, which also matches gnome-screensaver background inside Lubuntu session, the steps are below:
  1. Set preferred desktop background on running Lubuntu session by right-click > Desktop Preferences > Background.
  2. Log-out from Lubuntu session.
  3. On the log-in prompt, select LXDE as desktop session to log into.
  4. Once inside LXDE, you'll see the desktop background that gnome-screensaver uses as background.
  5. From the right-click menu, change the background to match your preference.
That's all !!! Now, you can log in back into Lubuntu and lock screen by initiating gnome-screensaver (I use a Compiz command shortcut with Ctrl+Alt+L which triggers "gnome-screensaver-command --lock") and desktop background will match.

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