I'm on KDE 4.7.2 release 5, on OpenSUSE.

I'm having trouble with suspend when there are two users logged into KDE
simultaneously.

When I run with just one graphical login, suspending works fine, for
either user. When I run two simultaneous graphical logins, when one user
tries to suspend, a dialog appears on the other's screen.

e.g., When user Toby's desktop is idle for 1 minute, the screen blanks,
but the computer does not suspend. Instead, a dialog appears on user B's
desktop saying:
"Authentication is required to suspendo the system"

This is a PolicyKit dialog, the text comes from
/usr/share/polkit-1/actions/org.freedesktop.upower.policy
which reads as follows: http://pastebin.com/eVPZUNzZ
(I know this because I changed it from suspend to suspendo!)

However, if Toby then opens a Konsole window and runs
sudo /usr/sbin/pm-suspend
then the system does suspend! Ergo, the permissions are fine. This makes me think it's a KDE issue?

N.b.:
I've been setting power settings using KDE's "Power Profiles" control
module. I've tried setting them to one, or both of the users.
I also adjusted org.freedesktop.upower.policy to "Allow" using KDE's "Actions Policy" control module.

Interesting. These are completely seperate user accounts right? It seems that PolicyKit is contacting the other users PolicyKit authorisation agent instead of your own one.

Can you check the output of "ck-list-sessions" prior to trying to enact a logout - and see if the correct user is listed as active?

Difficult to explain so I'll walk through the steps to reproduce.
(I've coloured to help identify when I'm switching between users.)

Reboot machine.

Log in as Claire on tty7
Disable Claire's power settings. (i.e. "always on") using Power Profiles KDE control module.
Log in as Toby on tty8
Set computer to suspend session after 1 minute using Power Profiles KDE control module.
Run ck-list-sessions:

Code: Select all

Session1:
        unix-user = '1001'
        realname = 'Claire'
        seat = 'Seat1'
        session-type = ''
        active = FALSE
        x11-display = ':0'
        x11-display-device = '/dev/tty7'
        display-device = ''
        remote-host-name = ''
        is-local = TRUE
        on-since = '2012-03-03T19:28:02.291966Z'
        login-session-id = ''
Session2:
        unix-user = '1000'
        realname = 'Toby'
        seat = 'Seat1'
        session-type = ''
        active = TRUE
        x11-display = ':1'
        x11-display-device = '/dev/tty8'
        display-device = ''
        remote-host-name = ''
        is-local = TRUE
        on-since = '2012-03-03T19:29:04.525575Z'
        login-session-id = ''


That looks OK.
Wait 1 minute. System suspends OK.
Resume system with power button.
Ctrl-Alt-F7 to switch to Claire's KDE session.
Run ck-list-sessions:

Code: Select all

Session1:
        unix-user = '1001'
        realname = 'Claire'
        seat = 'Seat1'
        session-type = ''
        active = TRUE
        x11-display = ':0'
        x11-display-device = '/dev/tty7'
        display-device = ''
        remote-host-name = ''
        is-local = TRUE
        on-since = '2012-03-03T19:28:02.291966Z'
        login-session-id = ''
Session2:
        unix-user = '1000'
        realname = 'Toby'
        seat = 'Seat1'
        session-type = ''
        active = FALSE
        x11-display = ':1'
        x11-display-device = '/dev/tty8'
        display-device = ''
        remote-host-name = ''
        is-local = TRUE
        on-since = '2012-03-03T19:29:04.525575Z'
        login-session-id = ''


Wait 1 minute.
System does not suspend.

Ctrl-Alt-F8 to switch to Toby's session.
Dialogue: "Authentication is required to suspend the system"
Enter root password
System suspends.

Ok, this is expected behaviour - apart from the prompt even appearing on Toby's screen.

This is because KDE default PolKit rules only permit the currently active user to perform actions involving Power Management. At the same time, Power Management is supposed to stop attempting to perform actions when it is not active.

However it seems it is still continuing to attempt to perform actions - and being correctly blocked by PolKit.

It is setup this way because each user is permitted to set their own Power Management policy according to their preferences - and should not have the Power Management policies of other users interfering in their work and own preferences.

OK, thanks for the explanation.
I've set power settings for both users to suspend after 1 minute, now, but I still get problematic behaviour:

Reboot
Log in as Claire on tty7
Log in as Toby on tty8
Wait 1 minute
Screen blanks, but system does not suspend.
Wiggle mouse
Unlock Toby on tty8
No dialogs shown.
ctrl-alt-F7
Unlock Claire on tty7
Dialogue: "Authentication is required to suspend the system"
[cancel]
ctrl-alt-F8
Dialogue: "Authentication is required to suspend the system"
[cancel]
Wait 1 minute
System does not suspend. System remains on indefinitely!

It appears that Polkit stops verifying actions once it has an active request. In this case, it seems that Claire's session gets there first - and blocks up Polkit.

Unfortunately i'm not sure what to do here. It seems that both Polkit and KDE Power Management have bugs which are preventing the desired action from taking place here.

What about having tty7 set to suspend at 1 minute, and tty8 set to suspend at 2 minutes? Would that avoid the clash?

The similarity in times is not what causes the clash - it is the other session attempting to perform Power Management actions such as sleeping the system when it is not the active session.

Unfortunately i'm not sure you can do much to avoid this... please file a bug at bugs.kde.org regarding the inactive session status not disabling KDE Power Management.

I've created a bug at https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=295381.

If you can think of any information that would be useful to include on that bug report I would appreciate the advice.

Thanks for the help!

As a temporary fix for this, do you think it would help if one user was on KDE and the second user logged in with a different window manager? e.g. IceWM, XFCE, FVWM...

Yes, this would be an applicable workaround. Alternatively, make sure the "polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1" process is not running on either user. This way only the active user will be permitted to perform a Polkit action - and all other ones will instantly be denied.

Code: Select all

sudo killall polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1

seems to stop suspending working altogether.
Is there a better way to stop it running?

Unfortunately I am not aware of a way. You will need to wait for your bug to be fixed - or otherwise ensure that only one of the two polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1 processes is running - that of the active user.

Do I understand correctly: somehow kill polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1 for one user and start it for the other, each time someone presses ctrl-alt-F7 or ctrl-alt-F8? Not sure how to go about that to be honest!

That is correct. Unfortunately i'm not sure either... your best bet is really to get the KDE Power Management bug fixed.