[KDE4] what component does the screenlocking?

[René J.V. Bertin]

Hi,

Sorry for cross-posting, I'm hoping it'll increase my chances of reaching someone who has an answer to the following.

After upgrading my hardware to an N3150-based notebook, my KUbuntu 14.04 install has developed an annoying quirk. From time to time, the screensaver fails to start (= I get the default bluish background image, nothing more). This wouldn't be a real issue, but often this also means that the screen/session locking feature becomes unreliable.

Unreliable here means that the lock works fine, but as soon as I start typing to unlock the session (or even move the mouse) the dialog changes to claim that the authentication system failed to work.

These symptoms are (more) likely to happen when I leave applications running that "do video", like Spotify or just this morning, a youtube video in an Opera tab. When they kick in I cannot start another KDE session (most applications just crash), for reasons I haven't yet been able to understand.

I'm running very recent kdelibs and the latest kde-workspace and kde-runtime packages, installed from a PPA of my own and packaged using the stock packaging scripts.

What component(s) might be involved? Who's responsible for the screensaver and screen/session locking? Is there a way to get an on-screen keyboard in the session unlock screen?

Thank,
R.