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I have a TV connected to my computer by HDMI and some 10 - 15 minutes after turning it off my computer displays flicker, windows from the TV move over to the other monitors, etc. I would like to prevent this behaviour, leave windows on the TV, etc.

I have found suggestions to use gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.xrandr active false, however this setting no longer appears to exist as of my version: Ubuntu 21.10, GNOME 40.4.0.

Additionally there have been suggestions to set amdgpu.dc=0. I did not even check if this resolves the screen issue as it completely disables audio over HDMI when I tested it -- which defeats the purpose of having the TV hooked up to the computer.

  • Happens in both X11 & Wayland
  • Currently have an xrandr config in ~/.screenlayout that configures my monitors quite well, if they would just stay put
  • Have tried disabling / enabling all power saving features on the TV itself
Merritt
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  • I don't think you can have the cake and eat it. What you want, if made a feature, would be a nightmare for most users. That's why it's neither a feature nor even an option. In a multi-screen setup with extended desktop when one of the monitors no longer exists (turned off) what you describe is exactly what should happen, the re-arrangement of the desktop to fit the screens that are actually on at any given time. And you probably misunderstood the suggestions you mentioned. – ChanganAuto Mar 11 '22 at 13:44
  • To be clear: It is possible to configure a "virtual" display (fake, dummy,...) but what you want is to have one of those kick in replacing the real one as soon as it turns off and conversely having it turned off automatically when the real one turn on. That's simply not possible. – ChanganAuto Mar 11 '22 at 13:49
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    @ChanganAuto "What you want, if made a feature, would be a nightmare for most users." Yes, I am not proposing this be made a default behaviour for GNOME - simply the behaviour on my computer. For reference, I can easily achieve this on KDE by going to Settings > Startup and Shutdown > Background Services and disabling "KScreen 2". On KDE this works great, and is in no way a "nightmare" for me. I am just trying to do the same thing on GNOME. This may simply not be possible on GNOME right now, but in general it is possible and workable :) – Merritt Mar 11 '22 at 16:29
  • Thank you SO much for asking this question and also referencing the solution in KDE! I'm in KDE Plasma 5.24.4 and was looking for the same exact functionality despite others saying it shouldn't even be an option. I have a TV that I use when I want to share with others, but otherwise often gets used for other devices (consoles, etc.). I don't want the programs that I leave there to jump to my main screen. I'm super happy to hear that this is so easy to accomplish in KDE. – Vaesse Aug 20 '22 at 04:41
  • @Vaesse Glad to hear it helped you! KDE / GNOME definitely have their own pros and cons, and this is still something that is easy in KDE and impossible in GNOME sadly. – Merritt Aug 20 '22 at 14:17
  • I’ve been looking for a solution to this for so long. Wondering if it’s worth it to raise a feature request about this on GNOME’s issue tracker… although I’m not exactly sure under what project that feaure request belongs. Seriously considering just moving to KDE just for this feature, although I would really just prefer using GNOME otherwise. – Person Nov 30 '22 at 14:46
  • @Person There appears to be several issues open in mutter / gnome-shell tracking bugs that seem pertinent: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/mutter/-/issues/761 https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-shell/-/issues/2092 https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/mutter/-/issues/1419 https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/mutter/-/issues/2131 ... Though they haven't seen much progress. Recommend giving the issues a thumbs up for visibility. – Merritt Nov 30 '22 at 18:27
  • Hmm… none of those issues are an exact match to my issue. For me, the issue is less about the windows moving around, and more about there being auto-display configuration based on monitor power states. I have two desktop monitors (DP) and one TV (HDMI) continuously connected to the PC. The problem: when the TV is powered on, GNOME will make the TV the only active display, causing the desktop displays to go black. The TV is in other use as well (not only for the PC), so this is undesirable. I’d like to turn that automatic behaviour off and just enable the TV display manually when I do need it. – Person Nov 30 '22 at 21:37
  • I’ll still upvote those issues and subscibe to them just in case. – Person Nov 30 '22 at 21:37

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