User switching in xfce

[gr0x0rd]

I've used xfce for a number of years now. Recently, my girlfriend's laptop has started overheating, and she has decided she hates it. So I often find her sitting at my desktop facebooking or god knows what else.

I thought it would be easy to simply have her switch to her own profile, so I created one for her, but didn't notice any user switching feature in xfce with the packages I had emerged. I did some googling and discovered that there was a plugin for this called xfswitch.

I emerged this plugin and added the object to the panel. However, after initiating a user switch, I get a notification that GDM isn't running and is required for this plugin to work.

Is there anyone out there that has gotten this feature working without GDM? I'm fairly fond of slim, and don't really want GDM and its dependencies unless absolutely necessary. Anyone? Bueller?

Thanks for reading.
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~g
emerge -FML...

[lexming]

I do not use this option myself (just one user in mi laptop ) but in the new XFCE 4.10 the actions-plugin (a panel's default plugin to shut down/restart/logout) has now the option "Switch User" (screenshot at http://www.xfce.org/about/tour). Maybe an update is worth trying. I had no problems at all going from 4.8 to 4.10.

[ssuominen]

xfswitch-plugin is requiring this program called "gdmflexiserver" which is provided originally only by gnome-base/gdm, but now also by x11-misc/lightdm,
since http://bugs.gentoo.org/411921 we have had support for the lightdm in =xfce-extra/xfswitch-plugin-0.0.1-r1, so you might want to give it a try

[shrike]

gr0x0rd,

Have you tried the 'Logout' function? On my ~amd64 box (xfce(4.10)/slim without GDM) 'Logout' returns me to Slim's login screen. In my case I change to a user with no .asoundrc file which simplifies Jack setup.

Like lexming I too have a 'switch user' option though it is ghosted out.

shrike

[gr0x0rd]

Thanks for the responses guys!

lexming, last time I tried riding ahead of the portage defaults, I created a nice little mess for myself, so I thought I'd try ssuominen's way first

shrike, we've been using logout previously- but implementing the user switching means I won't lose my open programs, etc while she uses the gentoo box.

ssuominen, excellent advice as usual- thanks. I'm now switching users easily using lightdm. However I still have one problem- when the screensaver kicks in or the screen is locked, I still have to enter in my password to unlock the screen before I can switch users.

I've emerged xscreensaver with the new-login USE flag, so I have an option for that, but when I select it, I get the old familiar "GDM is not running" message. Some googling shows other circumvented this by using the gnome screensaver instead of xscreensaver... is there a way to tinker with xscreensaver so the "New Login" button kicks to the lightdm logon screen?

The xscreensaver documentation I've looked at says "If gdmflexiserver is installed on your system, there should be a "New Login" button on xscreensaver's unlock dialog. If that doesn't appear or doesn't work right, check the setting of the "newLoginCommand" preference in the XScreenSaver.ad app-defaults file." But, I can't seem to find this file in Gentoo.

Cheers!
_________________
~g
emerge -FML...

[gr0x0rd]

Still working on this.

Other searches have recommended editing a file

[gr0x0rd]

Finally found it...

[lkraav]

I just installed xfswitch-plugin-0.0.1-r1 with lightdm, but the Switch User menu option is greyed out. What to look out for here?

[szczerb]

I'm in the same situation right now. Although switching from a locked screen works (xscreensaver built with "new-login" USE flag).

Will try to look into the xfswitch-plugin tomorrow.