How can a script detect if the user is idle

Posted by josinalvo on Ask Ubuntu See other posts from Ask Ubuntu or by josinalvo
Published on 2012-10-17T16:40:28Z Indexed on 2012/10/17 17:20 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 301

Filed under:

xorg

|

bash

I want to check, inside a bash script (*), how much time the user of a X session has been idle

The user himself does not have to be using bash, but just X. If the user just moved the mouse, for example, a good answer would be "idle for 0 seconds". If he has not touched the computer in 5 minutes, a good answer would be "idle for 300 seconds"

The reason to not use xautolock straight away is to be able to implement some complex behavior. For example, if the user is idle for 10 minutes, try to suspend, if he is idle for more 5 minutes, shutoff (I know it sounds odd, but suspend does not always work here ...)

(*)or could be another language.

© Ask Ubuntu or respective owner

Related posts about xorg

Ubuntu 11.04 update fail!

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I try to update Ubuntu Natty Narwhal, but I got this error: dpkg: .../xserver-xorg-core_2%3a1.9.99.901+git20110131.be3be758-0ubuntu6_i386.deb miatt xserver-xorg-core-t is tartalmazza: xserver-xorg-core breaks xserver-xorg-video-8 nvidia-current provides xserver-xorg-video-8 and is present and… >>> More
Removing broken packages on distro update (13.04 to 13.10)

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
i'm kinda new to linux. last night i tried upgrading from 13.04 to 13.10 but i got the "could not calculate" error. i read this question and found this error in the main log: Dist-upgrade failed: 'E:Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.' and here's a list of my broken packages… >>> More
Ubuntu 12.10 broken, shutdown while updating

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I got the following problem: My PC shutdown while upgrading from 12.04 to 12.10. Everything seems to work but I can't install the missing updates. It always tells me to run apt-get install -f, but when I do so it just says: (It's in German, hope it doesn't matter) Paketlisten werden gelesen... Fertig Abhängigkeitsbaum… >>> More
How can I fix apt-get autoremove wanting to uninstall most of my packages?

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I did change my packages in synaptic from manually installed to Automatically (they were not manually installed but automatically). Now they are marked for Autoremove. I tested it with sudo apt-get autoremove and the result is shown below (a reduced version because its almost all packages). I remember… >>> More
MacPorts - Installing Port, Dependencies Failed

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I am attempting to install xulrunner on OSX 10.6.3 using the following: sudo port install xulrunner However, I am receiving the following error: nat-10-200-136-126:phoneyc-new $ sudo port install xulrunner ---> Computing dependencies for xulrunner ---> Activating zlib @1.2.5_0 Error: The… >>> More

Related posts about bash

launching a program from bash causes bash to go to new prompt

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
When I run a program from the console, e.g. me@box:~$ firefox I expect the console to log error messages (I think this is std out or std err?) and other items from the program, firefox in this case. But today I notice that bash just opens the program and goes to a new prompt, e.g. me@box:~$… >>> More
How to debug a .bash_profile

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I was updating my .bash_profile, and unfortunetly I made a few updates and now I am getting: env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory -bash: tar: command… >>> More
Every command fails with "command not found" after changing .bash_profile?

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I was updating my .bash_profile, and unfortunetly I made a few updates and now I am getting: env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory env: bash: No such file or directory -bash: tar: command… >>> More
Is there any fundamental difference between piping in mac and linux?

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
ps -e | grep bash sample output from a linux machine: 1128 pts/14 00:00:00 bash 7491 pts/7 00:00:00 bash 12651 pts/14 00:00:00 bash 16145 pts/2 00:00:00 bash sample output from a mac machine: 58352 ttys000 0:00.09 login -pfl username /bin/bash -c exec -la bash /bin/bash 58353 ttys000… >>> More
why is $0 set to -bash?

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
First login process name seems to be set to "-bash", but if I subshell then it becomes "bash". for example: root@nowere:~# echo $0 -bash root@nowere:~# bash root@nowere:~# echo $0 bash -bash is causing some scripts to fail, such as . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule exec /usr/share/debconf/frontend… >>> More