F38 and new GDM behavior

[Jeffrey Walton]

Hi Everyone,

I have a headless workstation that was upgraded from F37 to F38 this
morning. After the upgrade I SSH'd back in and began performing
post-install tasks, like cleaning up old packages and old symlinks.

After 15 minutes of cleanup GDM suspended the machine with an active
SSH connection. I got a message on my tty:

Broadcast message from gdm@skylake on tty1 (Sat 2023-04-22 12:26:40 EDT):
The system will suspend now!
client_loop: send disconnect: Broken pipe

I could not SSH back into the machine. I had to drive across town to
wake it back up.

It seems this is new behavior for Fedora 38:
https://src.fedoraproject.org/rpms/gnome-settings-daemon/c/c8f9665aca0617a92...
.

Thanks to u/EatMeerkats on Reddit for the explanation.
(https://www.reddit.com/r/Fedora/comments/12vfnt8/f38_suspends_with_active_ss...)
.

The workaround I used was to mask the power states. No more sleeping
while I am using SSH...

# systemctl mask sleep.target suspend.target hibernate.target
hybrid-sleep.target
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/sleep.target → /dev/null.
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/suspend.target → /dev/null.
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/hibernate.target → /dev/null.
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/hybrid-sleep.target → /dev/null.

Jeff

[Joe Zeff]

On 04/22/2023 11:28 PM, Jeffrey Walton wrote:
> After 15 minutes of cleanup GDM suspended the machine with an active
> SSH connection.

If the machine is headless, why are you running Gnome on it?

[Jeffrey Walton]

On Sun, Apr 23, 2023 at 1:41 AM Joe Zeff  wrote:
> On 04/22/2023 11:28 PM, Jeffrey Walton wrote:
> > After 15 minutes of cleanup GDM suspended the machine with an active
> > SSH connection.
>
> If the machine is headless, why are you running Gnome on it?

It used to be a daily driver back when Skylake was new. Now it is
relegated to testing the Skylake Instruction Set Architecture (ISA)
for crypto libraries, like Botan, Crypto++ and OpenSSL.

I just keep upgrading it every 6 months.

Jeff

[Joe Zeff]

On 04/22/2023 11:44 PM, Jeffrey Walton wrote:
> I just keep upgrading it every 6 months.

Even so, there's no reason for you to be running it in full graphical 
mode.  Multi-user (what used to be runlevel 3) is all you need.

[Ron Yorston]

Jeffrey Walton wrote:
> After 15 minutes of cleanup GDM suspended the machine with an active
> SSH connection.

I was bitten by this too.  Left my system logged in to a GNOME desktop
carrying out some backups, went out for a walk, came back to find the
machine unresponsive.

As you say, this is new in F38, though apparently pristine GNOME has
had this misfeature for a while.

There's a write up here:

https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/gnome-suspends-after-15-minutes-of-us...

"User inactivity" is a poor criterion for suspending a machine.

Ron

[Tim]

On Sun, 2023-04-23 at 08:05 +0100, Ron Yorston wrote:
> "User inactivity" is a poor criterion for suspending a machine.

+20,000

I have machines that run 24/7, whether *I* am using them, or *I* have
left them to their own devices.  Even if I log out, I have the machines
doing things that I want them to continue doing.

I always go into the screensaver/screenlocker settings and set the
screensavers to suit me.  I don't ever recall having to change any of
the power-management settings on anything but my laptop.

And re:
https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/gnome-suspends-after-15-minutes-of-us...

Does Fedora need to pursue "energy certification requirements"?  Is it
certified, does it show that anywhere?

Perhaps the first login walk-through should also include taking you
into the screensaver and power management settings.

I'm more than a bit sick of "energy efficient" appliances.  Economy
mode on my washing machine doesn't actually clean the clothes, economy
flush on the loo doesn't actually flush it, and isn't hygienic (if you
can smell people's urine, you're breathing it in).  Economy paper
towels are so useless that you use a wad of them to get the job done.

All they really do is tick the box of some bureaucratic bullshit.