Hi!
I decided to connect my TV as second monitor and am trying different configurations. First i tried a "normal" xrandr approach and didnt liked the result - no negative coordinates (0x0 is always a left most screen - so i would have to learn to switch to left screen by moving mouse to the right if i want my TV located physically to the left act as an secondary monitor) and virtual desktops switching on both monitors (afaik trinity have no support for separate virtual desktops in different monitors? i hope i am wrong but doesnt looks so :( ). So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w" line to my xorg.conf and do tdm-trinity restart i am greeted with "this computer is locked enter password to unlock" on a TV and there is no escape from it other than killing X. Entering password just make it blink for a second and return back. Can this be somehow avoided or trinity is incapable of working on multiple screens?
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-11 02:03 (UTC+0300):
I decided to connect my TV as second monitor and am trying different configurations. First i tried a "normal" xrandr approach and didnt liked the result - no negative coordinates (0x0 is always a left most screen - so i would have to learn to switch to left screen by moving mouse to the right if i want my TV located physically to the left act as an secondary monitor) and virtual desktops switching on both monitors (afaik trinity have no support for separate virtual desktops in different monitors? i hope i am wrong but doesnt looks so :( ). So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w" line to my xorg.conf and do tdm-trinity restart i am greeted with "this computer is locked enter password to unlock" on a TV and there is no escape from it other than killing X. Entering password just make it blink for a second and return back. Can this be somehow avoided or trinity is incapable of working on multiple screens?
It can be vexing to get the hang of it, but it is certainly doable. The xorg.conf methodology is a bit tougher to figure out, but can in some cases WRT the login greeter be more effective. I have TDE working with multiple displays with Intel, ATI and GeForce gfxchips.
You might want to give arandr a try before continuing with either manual configuration method.
http://fm.no-ip.com/Share/Linux/ contains a bunch of xorg.conf templates. It also contains a setup file, which contains nothing but functional one-line xrandr commands, many of which are for configuring dual displays of various resolutions with various gfxchips. Note that the fbmm and dpi parameters are options I use, not required. I use them when forced 96 DPI is unwelcome, which is normal here.
If none of the above is help enough, when you post back, be sure to show us an Xorg.0.log, xrandr commands and/or xorg.conf* you tried, and some detail about what hardware you're working with, 'inxi -c0 -G' at a minimum. What distro?
If you start X using startx you ought to be able to go into settings and set a longer timeout on or turn off the screen locker.
On Wed, 10 May 2017 20:10:19 -0400 Felix Miata mrmazda@earthlink.net wrote:
It can be vexing to get the hang of it, but it is certainly doable. The xorg.conf methodology is a bit tougher to figure out, but can in some cases WRT the login greeter be more effective. I have TDE working with multiple displays with Intel, ATI and GeForce gfxchips.
You might want to give arandr a try before continuing with either manual configuration method.
As i said i tried multiple displays on a single logical screen first, but in my use case it runs into a huge and apparently unfixable problem. I googled a lot after stumbling on it, and there is multiple bug reports in almost every distro and for Xorg itself without any resolution for many years. The problems stems from the fact that there is no negative screen coordinates in X. 0:0 is always an upper left corner of the leftmost display. Even though xrandr accepts negative values when defining output positions if you look at xrandr -q afterward you would see that it actually puts the leftmost display at 0 and shifts all others to the right. This not a big problem when you screen setup is permanent, there could be some problems with fullscreen games but nothing critical, but as soon as you want you additional, sometimes off sometimes on, monitor to be left one everything goes bonkers. Because every time you connect/disconnect it display coordinates of you main (right) monitor change. And that means that all windows with pinned positions and all maximized windows starts jumping around, you can no longer force programs to start at certain position because that position is different depending on whenever second display is connected or not.
So if i would be forced into multiple display on a single screen i will have to set TV as a right display logically, at try to get used to moving mouse to the opposite edge to to move between displays :(
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-11 08:12 (UTC+0300):
0:0 is always an upper left corner of the leftmost display.
This sounds like a problem we may have solved or found a workround for. Without reading the whole thread I don't remember:
https://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-factory/2017-02/msg00431.html
So if i would be forced into multiple display on a single screen i will have to set TV as a right display logically, at try to get used to moving mouse to the opposite edge to to move between displays :(
Assuming there is no proper solution to be found, might you find it easier as a workaround WRT mousing to logically position the extra display below instead of where you want it in its physical location left? At least the moves would be shorter up/down than sideways. :-p
On Thu, 11 May 2017 01:56:37 -0400 Felix Miata mrmazda@earthlink.net wrote:
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-11 08:12 (UTC+0300):
0:0 is always an upper left corner of the leftmost display.
This sounds like a problem we may have solved or found a workround for. Without reading the whole thread I don't remember:
https://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-factory/2017-02/msg00431.html
There is no resolution in this threads (well, kde plasma script that overrides position is a one, but its a) kde plasma b) ugly hack ). Other than that just a links to a lot of bugreports and explanations of the 0:0 problem. The only proposed solution is to go multiple screens and that exactly what i am trying to do and what trinity "session locked" blocks me from :)
So if i would be forced into multiple display on a single screen i will have to set TV as a right display logically, at try to get used to moving mouse to the opposite edge to to move between displays :(
Assuming there is no proper solution to be found, might you find it easier as a workaround WRT mousing to logically position the extra display below instead of where you want it in its physical location left? At least the moves would be shorter up/down than sideways. :-p
Yep, that probably would be better :)
On Thu, 11 May 2017, Nick Koretsky wrote:
Hi!
I decided to connect my TV as second monitor and am trying different configurations. First i tried a "normal" xrandr approach and didnt liked the result - no negative coordinates (0x0 is always a left most screen - so i would have to learn to switch to left screen by moving mouse to the right if i want my TV located physically to the left act as an secondary monitor) and virtual desktops switching on both monitors (afaik trinity have no support for separate virtual desktops in different monitors? i hope i am wrong but doesnt looks so :( ). So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w" line to my xorg.conf and do tdm-trinity restart i am greeted with "this computer is locked enter password to unlock" on a TV and there is no escape from it other than killing X. Entering password just make it blink for a second and return back. Can this be somehow avoided or trinity is incapable of working on multiple screens?
Trinity is definitely capable of working with multiple screens.
I have a 3840x2160 screen on the left and a 1920x1200 screen rotated 90 degrees on the right.
All set up with the Trinity Control Center.
cheers
ant
On Thu, 11 May 2017 12:31:24 +1200 ant aw30@sayne.org wrote:
On Thu, 11 May 2017, Nick Koretsky wrote:
Hi!
I decided to connect my TV as second monitor and am trying different configurations. First i tried a "normal" xrandr approach and didnt liked the result - no negative coordinates (0x0 is always a left most screen
- so i would have to learn to switch to left screen by moving mouse to
the right if i want my TV located physically to the left act as an secondary monitor) and virtual desktops switching on both monitors (afaik trinity have no support for separate virtual desktops in different monitors? i hope i am wrong but doesnt looks so :( ). So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w" line to my xorg.conf and do tdm-trinity restart i am greeted with "this computer is locked enter password to unlock" on a TV and there is no escape from it other than killing X. Entering password just make it blink for a second and return back. Can this be somehow avoided or trinity is incapable of working on multiple screens?
Trinity is definitely capable of working with multiple screens.
I have a 3840x2160 screen on the left and a 1920x1200 screen rotated 90 degrees on the right.
All set up with the Trinity Control Center.
This line indicates that you do not get what i am talking about :) In X terminology screen refers not to a physical device but to a logical abstraction, a screen can have more that one physical display. Trinity Control Center only works with multiple displays within a single screen, not with multiple screens.
On Thu, 11 May 2017 02:03:51 +0300 Nick Koretsky nick_koretsky@ukr.net wrote:
Hi!
I decided to connect my TV as second monitor and am trying different configurations. First i tried a "normal" xrandr approach and didnt liked the result - no negative coordinates (0x0 is always a left most screen - so i would have to learn to switch to left screen by moving mouse to the right if i want my TV located physically to the left act as an secondary monitor) and virtual desktops switching on both monitors (afaik trinity have no support for separate virtual desktops in different monitors? i hope i am wrong but doesnt looks so :( ). So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w" line to my xorg.conf and do tdm-trinity restart i am greeted with "this computer is locked enter password to unlock" on a TV and there is no escape from it other than killing X. Entering password just make it blink for a second and return back. Can this be somehow avoided or trinity is incapable of working on multiple screens?
A little more info from some experimentation. I get the same "session locked" if i start a second x session via startx manually, but this time it can be unlocked. And i am presented with this "session locked" every time i switch between sessions. So i believe what is happening is that when i try to run multiple screens config is that it tries to lock my "inactive" screen constantly. So the real question is how to disable automatic locking of inactive X session? I looked in TDE Control Center but didnt found anything.
P.S. Reading logs - everything is the same as normal in all of them except XIO: fatal IO error 11 (Resource temporarily unavailable) on X server ":0" after 113 requests (113 known processed) with 5 events remaining. at the end of tdm.log
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-11 07:31 (UTC+0300):
A little more info...
would be nice, what distro and version at least, to help us try to help you.
On Thu, 11 May 2017 07:31:57 +0300 Nick Koretsky nick_koretsky@ukr.net wrote:
On Thu, 11 May 2017 02:03:51 +0300 Nick Koretsky nick_koretsky@ukr.net wrote:
Hi!
I decided to connect my TV as second monitor and am trying different configurations. First i tried a "normal" xrandr approach and didnt liked the result - no negative coordinates (0x0 is always a left most screen - so i would have to learn to switch to left screen by moving mouse to the right if i want my TV located physically to the left act as an secondary monitor) and virtual desktops switching on both monitors (afaik trinity have no support for separate virtual desktops in different monitors? i hope i am wrong but doesnt looks so :( ). So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w" line to my xorg.conf and do tdm-trinity restart i am greeted with "this computer is locked enter password to unlock" on a TV and there is no escape from it other than killing X. Entering password just make it blink for a second and return back. Can this be somehow avoided or trinity is incapable of working on multiple screens?
A little more info from some experimentation. I get the same "session locked" if i start a second x session via startx manually, but this time it can be unlocked. And i am presented with this "session locked" every time i switch between sessions. So i believe what is happening is that when i try to run multiple screens config is that it tries to lock my "inactive" screen constantly. So the real question is how to disable automatic locking of inactive X session? I looked in TDE Control Center but didnt found anything.
P.S. Reading logs - everything is the same as normal in all of them except XIO: fatal IO error 11 (Resource temporarily unavailable) on X server ":0" after 113 requests (113 known processed) with 5 events remaining. at the end of tdm.log
OK, i made this work by removing kdesktop_lock executable (does this have any hidden consequences?). Trinity is clearly multi-screens aware, it maintains a separate panels/desktop configuration for a second screen, and programs started from a menu invoked from second screen panel start on a second screen.
So far i like this way more than multiple monitors on a single screen. Separate virtual desktops on each monitor are GREAT. Of course no problems with 0:0 not on a main monitor. The only real drawback (apart from inability to move windows between monitors) is that you cant have different chrome or firefox windows on a different monitors without going different profiles.
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-12 06:24 (UTC+0300):
OK, i made this work by removing kdesktop_lock executable...
Using kcontrol (Trinity Control Center)?
arandr?
xrandr?
xorg.conf*?
Some combination?
On Fri, 12 May 2017 00:15:57 -0400 Felix Miata mrmazda@earthlink.net wrote:
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-12 06:24 (UTC+0300):
OK, i made this work by removing kdesktop_lock executable...
Using kcontrol (Trinity Control Center)?
arandr?
xrandr?
xorg.conf*?
Some combination?
Multiple screens can only be setup via xorg.conf. randr and kcontrol operate inside screen level.
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-12 09:51 (UTC+0300):
On Fri, 12 May 2017 00:15:57 -0400 Felix Miata wrote:
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-12 06:24 (UTC+0300):
OK, i made this work by removing kdesktop_lock executable...
Using kcontrol (Trinity Control Center)?
arandr?
xrandr?
xorg.conf*?
Some combination?
Multiple screens can only be setup via xorg.conf. randr and kcontrol operate inside screen level.
??? randr ???
https://linux.die.net/man/1/xrandr
Synopsis
xrandr ... [--screen snum] ...
--screen snum This option selects which screen to manipulate. Note this refers to the X screen abstraction, not the monitor (or output)....
???
On Sat, 13 May 2017 04:59:25 -0400 Felix Miata mrmazda@earthlink.net wrote:
Using kcontrol (Trinity Control Center)?
arandr?
xrandr?
xorg.conf*?
Some combination?
Multiple screens can only be setup via xorg.conf. randr and kcontrol operate inside screen level.
??? randr ???
https://linux.die.net/man/1/xrandr
Synopsis
xrandr ... [--screen snum] ...
--screen snum This option selects which screen to manipulate. Note this refers to the X screen abstraction, not the monitor (or output)....
It can manipulate properties of stuff INSIDE the screen, it cannot manipulate screen layout itself - add, remove, change positions, move outputs.
Nick Koretsky wrote:
So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w"
This is often made mistake. If you have a single head video card (one video processing), you have to configure multiple monitors not multiple screens. Than use xrandr --output ABC --left-of DEF. Perhaps ABC needs to be enabled - I usually do this through the icon (xrand) - switch to active and than position on the right side of the other active monitor.
regards
On Thu, 11 May 2017 08:32:23 +0200 deloptes deloptes@gmail.com wrote:
Nick Koretsky wrote:
So i wanted to try a multiple screens (in X sense) approach but hit a roadblock. As soon as i add Screen 1 "Philips" LeftOf "ZR24w"
This is often made mistake. If you have a single head video card (one video processing), you have to configure multiple monitors not multiple screens. Than use xrandr --output ABC --left-of DEF. Perhaps ABC needs to be enabled - I usually do this through the icon (xrand) - switch to active and than position on the right side of the other active monitor.
This is not a mistake, this is a deliberate effort to avoid problems of multiple display in a single screen setup.
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-11 10:20 (UTC+0300):
This is not a mistake, this is a deliberate effort to avoid problems of multiple display in a single screen setup.
Other than using DVI and HDMI rather than dual DVI, and FOSS only,
http://fm.no-ip.com/SS/Xorg/2head-3840x1200x108-nvGT218-big31-deb8TDE-priRight1200.jpg
seems to describe what you are actually after, but I'm not sure I understand what you are after, other than avoiding the screen locking problem that I'm not finding here. I know I'm using one Xorg "screen", and don't think I understand what problem multiple Xorg "screens" would solve for you.
On Thu, 11 May 2017 03:49:42 -0400 Felix Miata mrmazda@earthlink.net wrote:
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-11 10:20 (UTC+0300):
This is not a mistake, this is a deliberate effort to avoid problems of multiple display in a single screen setup.
Other than using DVI and HDMI rather than dual DVI, and FOSS only,
http://fm.no-ip.com/SS/Xorg/2head-3840x1200x108-nvGT218-big31-deb8TDE-priRight1200.jpg
seems to describe what you are actually after, but I'm not sure I understand what you are after, other than avoiding the screen locking problem that I'm not finding here. I know I'm using one Xorg "screen", and don't think I understand what problem multiple Xorg "screens" would solve for you. --
Each screen has its own coordinate system, so it avoids all problems stemming from "0:0 is an upper left corner always". The tradeoff is that you cant move windows between screens.
Nick Koretsky composed on 2017-05-11 11:17 (UTC+0300):
On Thu, 11 May 2017 03:49:42 -0400 Felix Miata wrote:
http://fm.no-ip.com/SS/Xorg/2head-3840x1200x108-nvGT218-big31-deb8TDE-priRight1200.jpg
seems to describe what you are actually after, but I'm not sure I understand what you are after, other than avoiding the screen locking problem that I'm not finding here. I know I'm using one Xorg "screen", and don't think I understand what problem multiple Xorg "screens" would solve for you. --
Each screen has its own coordinate system, so it avoids all problems stemming from "0:0 is an upper left corner always". The tradeoff is that you cant move windows between screens.
I don't understand what trouble '0:0 upper left corner always' creates. My screenshot's "HDTV" is at 0,0 left of my 1920x1200 at 1920,0 to match the room physics, so mouse on session start moved left goes left, moved right goes right, moved down hits menu starter, panel is on right screen, I can move apps between screens and have windows straddle screens. ???
On Thu, 11 May 2017 04:42:12 -0400 Felix Miata mrmazda@earthlink.net wrote:
seems to describe what you are actually after, but I'm not sure I understand what you are after, other than avoiding the screen locking problem that I'm not finding here. I know I'm using one Xorg "screen", and don't think I understand what problem multiple Xorg "screens" would solve for you. --
Each screen has its own coordinate system, so it avoids all problems stemming from "0:0 is an upper left corner always". The tradeoff is that you cant move windows between screens.
I don't understand what trouble '0:0 upper left corner always' creates. My screenshot's "HDTV" is at 0,0 left of my 1920x1200 at 1920,0 to match the room physics, so mouse on session start moved left goes left, moved right goes right, moved down hits menu starter, panel is on right screen, I can move apps between screens and have windows straddle screens. ???
I explained that to your once, but you seems to have missed it :)
This not a big problem when you screen setup is permanent, there could be some problems with fullscreen games but nothing critical, but as soon as you want you additional, sometimes off sometimes on, monitor to be left one everything goes bonkers. Because every time you connect/disconnect it display coordinates of you main (right) monitor change. And that means that all windows with pinned positions and all maximized windows starts jumping around, you can no longer force programs to start at certain position because that position is different depending on whenever second display is connected or not.
Nick Koretsky wrote:
On Thu, 11 May 2017 04:42:12 -0400 Felix Miata mrmazda@earthlink.net wrote:
seems to describe what you are actually after, but I'm not sure I understand what you are after, other than avoiding the screen locking problem that I'm not finding here. I know I'm using one Xorg "screen", and don't think I understand what problem multiple Xorg "screens" would solve for you. --
Each screen has its own coordinate system, so it avoids all problems stemming from "0:0 is an upper left corner always". The tradeoff is that you cant move windows between screens.
I don't understand what trouble '0:0 upper left corner always' creates. My screenshot's "HDTV" is at 0,0 left of my 1920x1200 at 1920,0 to match the room physics, so mouse on session start moved left goes left, moved right goes right, moved down hits menu starter, panel is on right screen, I can move apps between screens and have windows straddle screens. ???
I explained that to your once, but you seems to have missed it :)
This not a big problem when you screen setup is permanent, there could be some problems with fullscreen games but nothing critical, but as soon as you want you additional, sometimes off sometimes on, monitor to be left one everything goes bonkers. Because every time you connect/disconnect it display coordinates of you main (right) monitor change. And that means that all windows with pinned positions and all maximized windows starts jumping around, you can no longer force programs to start at certain position because that position is different depending on whenever second display is connected or not.
Perhaps my knowledge is outdated, but AFAIR one card - one screen. Even if the PC has multiple outputs - they are mapped to monitors in Xorg. Dual-head cards - can be using 2 screens or two cards in PC etc, however I never had to use one.
Your statement is partially true regarding positioning. It is true only if the coordinates are falling outside of the active monitor.
I still think you or we are mixing up the terminology here. I now checked few documents again and find out that my understanding was also partial
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/multihead
Note: The terms used in this article are very specific to avoid confusion:
Monitor refers to a physical display device, such as an LCD panel. Screen refers to an X-Window screen (that is: a monitor attached to a display). Display refers to a collection of screens that are in use at the same time showing parts of a single desktop (you can drag windows among all screens in a single display).
I also do not understand your problem completely. For example I have a monitor attached to two pcs. if I switch to the other pc and switch back - programs are still where they were. If I unplug or disable the monitor via xrandr. Programs are moved to the active monitor and resized/squeezed whatever. I have no problem with this as I understand that the software is trying its best to match the new available size of the monitor (resolution) etc.
This is also interesting: https://nouveau.freedesktop.org/wiki/MultiMonitorDesktop/
There were a lot of interesting things around wayland.
regards
-
ant -
deloptes -
Felix Miata -
Nick Koretsky