Multiple workspaces / multiple virtual desktops in Kicksecure 18 (Wayland / labwc)

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  1. I cannot run swaylock. I am using a gb keyboard layout (kinda, I will explain after) and have swaylock installed. When trying to install from the system maintenance panel, it said “Refusing to lock screen, because the correct screen locker cannot be determined. The XDG_SESSION_TYPE environment variable must be set to ‘x11’ or ‘wayland’ to determine the proper screen locker to use. However, XDG_SESSION_TYPE is currently set to ‘tty’. Please report this bug!“ I ran “XDG_SESSION_TYPE=wayland”. Still doesn’t work.

    1. The reason why I say I am kinda on gb is because I set gb in the install and it worked originally, but I think that after changing to kwin, it went to US, my /etc/vconsole.conf says gb, but it is still US.

    This is what is said when I did the keyboard config option in configuration center and keyboard layout.
    00:00:00.000 [../src/main.c:72] LABWC_PID not set
    set_labwc_keymap: WARNING: ‘labwc --reconfigure’ reconfiguration failed!
    set_labwc_keymap: INFO: new ‘/home/user/.config/labwc/environment’ contents:
    XKB_DEFAULT_LAYOUT=gb
    XKB_DEFAULT_VARIANT=
    XKB_DEFAULT_OPTIONS=
    set_labwc_keymap: INFO: Configuration success.

    Btw, the reason I changed to kwin instead of labwc, is because I really like having workspaces, but I couldn’t have workspaces without it. When I put desktop switcher in my pannel it shows “n/a”

    1. My trackpad isn’t working. I have no idea if this is because of kicksecure 18, but randomly it just stopped working, I was configuring kicksecure fine and my trackpad was working. (At this point swaylock worked) I went to do something, and when I came back it said someething along the lines of screenlock broken, go to terminal with ctrl+shift+f2. I shutdown, and after turning it on, my mouse didn’t move. I tried to reflash kicksecure and it still didn’t work, even during the install process and after too. I have been using a mouse plugged into my laptop. But I am sharing with my PC, this is really annoying.

    I would really appreciate some support, I can barely use my laptop right now. If I can go back to xfce, that would also work. Thanks.

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Switching the Wayland compositor used by Kicksecure isn’t supported currently. Supporting a Wayland compositor is much more involved than supporting a window manager under X11, because the compositor is both the window manager and the display server. Of all the desktop environments in Kicksecure, LXQt was the only one light enough to be suitable for Kicksecure and that had mature enough Wayland support, and the best-supported compositor for LXQt is labwc, so that’s what we went with. (For similar reasons, switching the desktop environment entirely is also difficult.) This is likely the source of both the screen lock and keyboard layout issues.

That being said, labwc does support multiple workspaces. LXQt’s workspace switcher doesn’t work with them yet, but you can configure keyboard shortcuts for switching workspaces in ~/.config/labwc/rc.xml. See labwc.

The trackpad issue sounds like it may be a hardware problem that showed up by coincidence. We don’t do anything special to the touchpad config in Kicksecure. Hopefully a reinstall will fix it, but it sounds like you tried that without success. I’ve previously managed to fix a broken touchpad by opening the laptop, then removing and re-inserting the touchpad’s ribbon cable.

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