Gnome 3 and user switching

[lverns]

Hi,

I’m using NoMachine to control a different computer on the same LAN. The “server” is running Debian Jessie. The Desktop Environment is Gnome 3.14

I’m using GDM for my display manager.

When I initially access the server with NoMachine, I arrive at the GDM login screen where I can then choose a user and log in. When I’m done, I can click the Log Out button in the Gnome menu and this takes me back to GDM where I can then choose another user or just quit NoMachine.

Here is my problem: When using GDM and Gnome together,  this enables “user switching”. In the Gnome Menu, I can click on “Switch User” instead of “Log Out” and this leaves all my programs running, but allows me (or anyone else) to log in to another account and do stuff.

Unfortunately, NoMachine does not work with this feature. If any user is clicks the “Switch User” button, NoMachine will only show a black screen.

I think this might have something to do with the fact that GDM spawns multiple X servers when you have more than on graphical session going at once

ps aux | grep Xorgroot       660  0.2  0.6 174216 22812 tty7     Ss+  06:59   0:02 /usr/bin/Xorg :0 -novtswitch -background none -noreset -verbose 3 -auth /var/run/gdm3/auth-for-Debian-gdm-Th3kAn/database -seat seat0 -nolisten tcp vt7
root      2337  0.0  0.6 172456 22908 tty2     Ss+  07:02   0:00 /usr/bin/Xorg :1 -novtswitch -background none -noreset -verbose 3 -auth /var/run/gdm3/auth-for-Debian-gdm-1qnxor/database -seat seat0 -nolisten tcp

NoMachine Version

4.5.0 on client and server

 

Has anyone here encountered (and overcome) this issue?

 

[lverns]

I’ve done more investigation into this issue. Here is how GDM **seems** to work.

On boot, GDM creates X display :0 on tty7. When the user logs in, GDM launches the desktop environment (in my case, Gnome) on X display :0. When I’m done, I click on “Log Out” in the system menu. Gnome then kills itself and all my processes. GDM detects this and relaunches itself on the :0 X display.

If I just follow the above workflow, only on Xorg session exists at one time and the currently displayed tty on the local machine never changes.

However, Instead of “Log Out”, I can choose “Switch User”. When I do that, Gnome launches a screen locker and then tells GDM to display the user list. GDM then creates display :1 on tty2 and switches the local display to tty2 so that it is presented to the user. I can switch between the lockscreen and the GDM user list by using the Ctrl-Alt-Fn keyboard shortcut.

Sadly, the NoMachine cannot make that jump and seems to continue always attach to the :0 display which, since it is not on the current tty, cannot be displayed.

Hmmm…. Maybe I should just disable Fast User Switching?

 

 

 

 

[Britgirl]

Hello, fast user switching isn’t currently available on Linux. We’ve opened a Feature Request for it which you can monitor here: https://www.nomachine.com/FR05M02934 .

[Author]

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