Hi there. Im running ubuntu 10.04 lts. Ive been struggling with automating a screensaver to come on and off at shceduled times. all is working fine except I cannot seem to get xscreensaver to start from cron. when i run it manually i need to use:
xscreensaver & and then hit enter.

I'm not sure whats happening as i only get the line that it ran in my logs but no error.

i am using xset to turn the display power on and off, then xscreensaver-command -activate and deactivate, after loading the xscreensaver daemon. everything automated works fine except starting xscreensaver daemon. if i run the same commands manually it works fine.

any ideas what i might be missing?


thank you!
Matt
if i leave the xscreensaver daemon running and shutoff display with xset it will come on again unless i kill xscreensaver.


fyi what im trying to do: my linux file/web/music server is on a tablet netbook and i flipped the screen around and am trying to also use it as a digital picture frame. which works fine, i just dnt want to run it needlessly 24/7

Think i found the issue: i need to run xscreensaver daemon as a user other than root in cron .... (gives error and wont start as user root). security i guess thanks anyways!