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1. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Friday, 25-Aug-2017 00:01:54 EDT Sean Tilley
   A mystery worth investigating: getting #ElectricSheep to work as a screensaver in #Gnome 3 on #Wayland.
   
   Electric Sheep is great; it's a beautiful program that has worked well for years. I'd argue that it's the only good screensaver on *nix. Compiling and running it in a Wayland environment is not an issue - it builds without incident, and the animation is as fluid as it ever was.
   
   
   
   However, Gnome 3 has no conceivable way to assign a default screensaver, because no feature or dedicated tool exists for that in the Gnome universe anymore. In the words of Gnome devs, You Don't Need That™.
   
   All I want is for the program to kick in if my computer has been idle for more than five minutes. Bonus points if it can be made into the background of the Gnome lock screen.
   
   I'm almost afraid that I may have to hack together some terrible wrapper script and duct tape a solution together myself.
   1. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Friday, 25-Aug-2017 00:05:05 EDT Sean Tilley

      in reply to
      Meanwhile, this is something that can be enabled within two clicks on a Macintosh computer.
   2. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Friday, 25-Aug-2017 03:12:47 EDT Sean Tilley

      in reply to
      It will take a few more years until Gnome reaches this stage again
   3. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Friday, 25-Aug-2017 03:24:12 EDT Sean Tilley

      in reply to
      @dsh If you get carried away build some tool for supporting Libre.fm in Clementine. 7 years and counting... ?
   4. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Friday, 25-Aug-2017 14:52:25 EDT Sean Tilley

      in reply to
      What makes you think it would return, Eckhard? Gnome intentionally avoids bells & whistles that don't fit target audience or encourage bad habits, and people using CRTs (and therefore needing screensavers) are incredibly rare and probably not using Gnome.
      
      I'm not saying they shouldn't have a screensaver option. I'm saying it doesn't fit with a Gnome approach to the desktop. It's not simple or clean.
   5. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Friday, 25-Aug-2017 16:22:04 EDT Sean Tilley

      in reply to
      Well, I think at some stage the user base will drop enough so that they consider making up their mind. At least in my environment there is nobody who uses Gnome3, for exactly that "simplicity" reason. And I am back at macOS and windows for the same reason. Linux is now banned into a VM with WindowMaker and xterm, that's enough (btw, this is simplicity).
   6. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Friday, 25-Aug-2017 17:44:48 EDT Sean Tilley

      in reply to
        
sudo apt-get remove gnome-screensaver
    sudo apt-get install xscreensaver
    sudo ln -s /usr/bin/xscreensaver-command /usr/bin/gnome-screensaver-command
    sudo apt-get install xscreensaver-gl-extra xscreensaver-data-extra
    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:caffeine-developers/ppa
    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ichthyo/zeug
    sudo apt-get update
    sudo apt-get install electricsheep caffeine python-glade2

      
      launch xscreensaver. quit.
      
      add the following lines to  ~/.xscreensaver...just under    GL:     rubikblocks -root       \n\
      
GL: electricsheep --root 1 \n\
      
      launch xscreensaver again and edit preferences...you should have electricsheep as an option now. Save, quit, restart ....should work.
   7. Sean Tilley (dsh@deadsuperhero.com)'s status on Saturday, 26-Aug-2017 14:02:49 EDT Sean Tilley

      in reply to
      Nothing involving MS Windows or a VM is simple.
      
      I'm glad different desktop environments take different approaches. Gnome's userbase has been slowly increasing, but if their approach is wrong, fine, maybe KDE will take the lead. Or Enlightenment. Or XMonad, OK not XMonad.
      
      As for the original poster, if you really want a screensaver and Gnome, then I suspect you probably would end up duct taping, as you say.