this post was submitted on 13 Jun 2024
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None of the desktop environments like xscreensaver because it breaks their window decorations and input handling. It does this for security purposes because its job is first and foremost to be as secure as possible then once that’s done go ahead and make pretty pictures.
If it sounds crazy that input and window decorations would be insecure, peruse the maintainers webpage and be horrified.
Wayland needs infinite workarounds to get xscreensaver working because the way you’d do it under the Wayland framework is with a weird method called uhh ext_session_lock (I reference it in another comment but I’m not sure that’s the right one now.) which at least as of about a year ago let screen locking programs handle passwords directly!
I think it’s an artifact of open source software being maintained by people who are on the payroll of companies that rely on the software.
Thanks for taking the time to reply, that makes a lot of sense.
I haven't switched to Wayland yet. It makes sense why xscreensaver wouldn't work well with an entirely different window server. I was just surprised it was so difficult (for me at least) to use with modern window managers despite being relevant and mature, haha.