Power off button acting differently?

[Aaron Konstam]

On Thu, 2012-03-15 at 21:23 -0500, Mikkel L. Ellertson wrote: 
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> On 03/15/2012 04:05 PM, Aaron Konstam wrote:
> > On Thu, 2012-03-15 at 10:13 -0500, Mikkel L. Ellertson wrote:
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> >> Pushing the power button, as opposed to holding it, is an ACPI event
> >> that is trapped. The action is controlled by
> >> /etc/acpi/events/powerconf. That defaults to running
> >> /etc/acpi/actions/power.sh. That script checks to see if a power
> >> manager is running. If so, the event is passed to the power manager.
> >> Is not, the system runs the shutdown command.
> >>
> >> Now, depending on what desktop you are running, you set what you
> >> want to happen by setting the action in the power manager setup.
> >> (This is under System Settings -->Power in Gnome.)
> >>
> >> Mikkel
> > ---
> > I don't disagree with what you are saying but getting used to
> shuting down an operating system
> > using the power button is a bad practice. For example on my machine
> > holding the power button shuts down the machine while pressing the
> > button puts the machine to sleep. I agree this is configurable. But
> that
> > is in Fedora Linux, on other systems it is treated as a system error.
> >
> >
> Well, the difference between pushing the power button, and holding
> to long enough to bypass the OS and turn the system off is rather
> pronounced in most systems. But that only applies to systems that
> can be powered off by using software. There are still systems around
> that use a rocker or push-on/push-off switch to turn them off.
> 
> But you do get Windows users that are also use the power button to
> have the system shutdown. Exactly what a power button press does is
> configurable in the power control panel on Windows as well - at
> least in any version of Windows that is using ACPI. For that matter,
> what happens when you close the lid on a laptop is also configurable.
> 
> I usually have my laptop go to sleep when I close the lid. That
> works best for the way I usually use the laptop. I have the power
> button configured to make it hibernate. But on my desktop, I have
> the power button do a shutdown. I do not use it often, but I have
> managed to lock up the system a time or two when playing with new
> hardware/software, and it was that, or ssh into the machine and do a
> shutdown that way. (Who would have expected a specific video card
> and TV tuner card to lock up the system when used together, but each
> would work fine with other hardware...)
> 
> So there is no one answer to this. That is why it is configurable,
> instead of being hard-coded. I think doing a shutdown is a
> reasonable default when there is no power manager software running,
> and passing it on the the power manager if it is running lets each
> user set their preference.
> 
> The nice thing about Linux is that the user gets to decide how
> things like this work. YMMV
> 
> Mikkel
> - -- 
Except in Gnome on F16 there is no gnome-power-manager. There is an rpm
with that naqmwe but the rpm does not contain a program with that name.
And none of the programs related to power allow you to program what
happens when you press the power button. By the way gnome-power-manager
when it exists does not provide you with that option.

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Aaron Konstam telephone: (210) 656-0355 e-mail: akonstam at sbcglobal.net