Bug#1029473: gnome-session: Automatic Suspend should not be enabled by default

[Witold Baryluk]

Package: gnome-session
Version: 43.0-1
Severity: normal
X-Debbugs-Cc: witold.baryluk at gmail.com


Rather annoying issue. In my opinion it might even deserve "grave" severity.

It appears in Power settings, Automatic Suspend is On by default (with 20
minutes delay).

Here is the problem.

I am on a desktop PC, always on, and have programs in a background that
must run non stop or for many hours (i.e. data acquisition / monitoring,
long running scripts, simulations, etc). I often use Live-CD (custom
built Debian iso using live-build), so I relay on defaults a lot. But
suspend to RAM is often broken on computers I use, and it often never
recovers, needing me to power cycle the computer, or even disconnect
power, waiting and connect power again. (long pressing power button does
not help). And even if it works, often a state of USB devices is lost,
which I have few (including the root file system).

So last time I used my system, after almost 10 hours of work, I went for
a break and some food, while some processes were running in a background.
Then came back about 30 minutes later, system was not responding
(monitors off, USB devices off, keyboard not doing anything), and power
button was blinking. Pressing it did not help, and needed to remove power
(at power supply), and connect back. Many hours of work lost.

I do not normally use Gnome Shell (I normally use MATE), but I accidently
logged into Gnome Shell, and wanted to give it a try. First time this
occured, I was really surprised, and I was thinking maybe it was a kernel
bug (I often use rc kernels). But it happened again on another kernel
version.

As I use Live-CD quite often, just changing a value is not an option
manually, as these settings will be lost after reboot. Not to mention
they are not intuitive for a novice user of Gnome Shell.

I do not understand why Automatic Suspend would be On by default.
Especially if the default power mode profile is Balanced (not Power
Saver).

A way better idea would be to detect a computer form factor, and power
source. If it is battery (i.e. not AC and not charging), then maybe do
enable a suspend. Otherwise no.

I also do not understand why Screen Blank in Power Saving Options is
"Never". A default should be few minutes.


Regards,
Witold



-- System Information:
Debian Release: bookworm/sid
  APT prefers testing-debug
  APT policy: (500, 'testing-debug'), (500, 'testing')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386

Kernel: Linux 6.0.0-6-amd64 (SMP w/32 CPU threads; PREEMPT)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE not set
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /usr/bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled

Versions of packages gnome-session depends on:
ii  gnome-session-bin                                      43.0-1
ii  gnome-session-common                                   43.0-1
ii  gnome-settings-daemon                                  43.0-3
ii  gnome-shell                                            43.1-2
ii  xdg-desktop-portal-gnome [xdg-desktop-portal-backend]  43.1-2
ii  xdg-desktop-portal-gtk [xdg-desktop-portal-backend]    1.14.1-1
ii  xdg-desktop-portal-kde [xdg-desktop-portal-backend]    5.26.4-1+b1
ii  xdg-desktop-portal-wlr [xdg-desktop-portal-backend]    0.6.0-1

gnome-session recommends no packages.

Versions of packages gnome-session suggests:
ii  desktop-base   12.0.2
ii  gnome-keyring  42.1-1+b1

-- no debconf information