I have an older laptop so no need to worry about the stupid Modern Standby introduced in late 2019. What I want is a reliable way to lock screen when suspend, doesnt matter how bloat or minimal.
First, to make sure the laptop suspends when I close the lid:
- on some Distro, this works OOTB.
- If it doesnt, I check /etc/systemd/sleep.conf and set allow Suspend from there.
After this, laptop does suspend. Now here comes the trickiest part, how to make sure your screen stays locked? There are so many rabbit holes so I want some help.
Depending on your software selections, you can fall into 3 categories:
- create some systemd script like this: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Slock
Problem: sometimes the screen doesnt get locked, i.e. your slock doesnt get triggered. Even worse, in some cases, the desktop is briefly shown on resume, before the locker shows up.
- use program like xss-lock, xautolock. Then links it with your locker and then autostart in your wm. Eg: i3wm with i3lock and xss-lock:
exec --no-startup-id xss-lock --transfer-sleep-lock – i3lock
This works. But the laptop sometimes takes a while to suspend.
- manually invoke “Lock” with a keystroke. Then close the lid. Apparently this works but I have to remember to manually “lock” every single time.
Thanks for any suggestions.
I recently finally configured my lockscreen again after switching to wayland. I’m using gtklock and so far it has been working really well. I’m using void linux with elogind installed, laptop suspends when closing the lid ootb. In order to trigger the lockscreen on suspend, i’m using a script placed in /etc/elogind/system-sleep, as described on the artix wiki
The only robust and no BS lock combo so far, imo, is Regolith i3wm.
For some reasons and whatever black magic eas used, this Frankenstein combo of i3 and GNOME work every single time. The downside is their configs are soooo messy. It is very hard to use whatever you have in vanilla i3 for Regolith.
