Recent changes seem to have broken electricsheep

Same problem here. Just running electric sheep on the cmd line gives me a :
----
X Error of faild request: BadMatch (invalid paramter attributes)
Major opcode of failed request: 141 (XVideo)
Minor opcode of failed request: 19 ()
Serial number of failed request: 87
Current serial number in output stream: 87
-----

Adding a "--mplayer 1" to the cmd line makes the call work in windows mode but adding it to the xml fuer gnome-screensaver doesn't change anything. I still get the behaviour described in the first report.

Thank for your bug. What video driver do you use? Could you get a backtrace with gdb running with --sync and with a break point on the gdk_x_error() call?

that's not a GTK app, the gdk_x_error stuff to get a backtrace doesn't apply to it ...

did you run electricsheep before? it takes between 10 and 30 minutes with decent bandwith to download the first sheep, it only starts to show something immediately if you already have the first sheep in ~/.sheep

Sure I did run electrisheep before. I also stated it works with --mplayer. And the X error is not because there is the sheep missing, believe me. Thanks anyway. :)

yes, sorry for that comment, i was away for 2 days and had the page open in my browser ... i simply didnt reload before commenting ;)

Having the same problem with electricsheep, have up to date system. Works fine in from command line in a window. Have got 5 sheep downloaded .sheep directory. Using the ATI Driver, all other screensavers appear to be working fine.

I have the same issue with an up to date Dapper system. It was noted elsewhere that if the xv port is unavailable, the program works fine. I tested this by playing something with mplayer and then running electric sheep. Under these conditions, the system worked correctly.

I also am using an ATI Driver, though elsewhere it was reported to also be a problem with the NVIDIA driver.

I am seeing this too. if I run electricsheep on its own it appears fine in a window, if I pass it --root 1 I just see some flickering on the desktop, but no errors from it. When it is launched from gnome-screensaver I see this in ~/.xsession-errors:

(gnome-screensaver:12210): gnome-screensaver-WARNING **: Could not execute command for theme: electricsheep --root 1

With reference to the previous comment about xv, I tried running mpeg2dec_onroot with the x11 video out option and it didn't work either

Is this still a problem? (i merged electricsheep yesterday)

Yes, this has continued to be a problem ever since Dapper work started.
Warty and Breezy worked wonderfully for me but Dapper and now Edgy continue
to fail. It's related, I believe, to ATI cards... though again, xscreensaver
worked perfectly with it, and gnome-screensaver does not, and like this one
user suggested, I can launch it manually and it runs fine.

On 8/14/06, Sarah Hobbs <email address hidden> wrote:
>
> Is this still a problem? (i merged electricsheep yesterday)
>
> --
> Recent changes seem to have broken electricsheep
> https://launchpad.net/bugs/5823
>

Sarah: I'm not running edgy, so I haven't seen any updated packages.
Matt: I'm definitely seeing this on an ATi card, but I think I've seen it on my home machine too (nVidia). I'll check.

BUMP: still seeing this exact same issue on Dapper Drake, system up to date 08/27/06.

I have an NVIDIA FX 5200 using Ubuntu binary nvidia package.

I have this problem (blank screen nothing renders) regardless of whether I use the ubuntu electricsheep pkg (2.6.6) or download and compile my own source of electricsheep (2.6.8). Not sure what the problem is.

Electricsheep is broken on Ubuntu, can we fix it? thanks. Please email me for any information you need (rush2112 at gmail). Thx.

More info:

Was reading on another <a href="http://fuxoft.blogspot.com/2006/06/nvidia-and-mplayer-dont-like-electric.html">thread</a>... One way I was able to get ElectricSheep working was:

1. apt-get install mplayer
2.open mplayer in my X session manually and leave it running
3. start electricsheep with --mplayer 1

Oddly enough if one doesn't start mplayer then it doesn't work.

Even with mplayer running I couldn't get gnome-screensaver to launch ElectricSheep successfully (just get black screen still). Could it be the way i'm specifying the launch parameters in /usr/share/gnome-screensaver/themes/electricsheep.desktop ? Here's what I have, am I quoting the "Exec" line right, and does TryExec need anything? I thought tryExec was only checked to see if the binary exists, which gets used to determine if the .desktop file should get put into the list of screensavers in System->Preferences->Screensavers...

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Name=ElectricSheep
Comment=Tim rules
TryExec=electricsheep
Exec="/usr/local/bin/electricsheep --max-megabytes 0 --mplayer 1 --standalone 1"
StartupNotify=false
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Categories=Screensaver

Got the same problem. "electricsheep" runs just fine, but the screensaver is only a black screen. Dapper on nvidia and i810 (laptop) driver.

I'm experiencing this on a Radeon 9200 and 9700 with 2.6.8-2ubuntu1. There is only a blank screen when electricsheep is run by gnome-screensaver regardless of whether the --root 1 or --mplayer 1 flags are included in the .desktop file. Electricsheep runs from a terminal if the --mplayer 1 flag is given or if mplayer is already running and electricsheep's mpeg2dec cannot use the xv port. In the second case it runs very slowly.

I emailed the developer a link to this bug report and received this reply:

thanks for the email -- unless someone tells me i don't
see these things. i don't have ubuntu, and so i can't
really debug this. i think it's a problem with the X
server or something, as electric sheep hasn't changed
how it does video for a long time. but if someone can
find a way to workaround the problem i would be happy
to incorporate it. what happens if you turn zoom off?
this might be related:
http://electricsheep.wikispaces.com/Linux+Zooming
best, -spot

The same workaround proposed for bug #14911 works for electricsheep

To get it working, I created a wrapper script at /usr/local/bin/sheepterm with the contents "XLIB_SKIP_ARGB_VISUALS=1 /usr/bin/electricsheep".

I created another one for the screensaver "XLIB_SKIP_ARGB_VISUALS=1 /usr/bin/electricsheep --zoom 1 --root 1" at /usr/local/bin/sheepscreen.

In /usr/share/applications/screensavers/electricsheep.desktop/electricsheep.desktop I changed the values to

"TryExec=sheepscreen
Exec=sheepscreen"

sheepterm runs fine from a terminal. However, sheepscreen launched from gnome-screensaver is still blank.

Hi,

Tried:

XLIB_SKIP_ARGB_VISUALS=1 /usr/bin/electricsheep --zoom 1 --root 1

but it doesn't work for me.

I've got an ATI X1600 and running gnome-screensaver. I get the sheep in the top left hand corner as a box, bu the rest of the screen is black. I've also got

Option "VideoOverlay" "on"
Option "OpenGLOverlay" "off"

in my xorg.conf as recommended in the posting 2 up.

I miss my sheep :(

-=david=-

Got it working. What's I missed before was that the executable in electricsheep.desktop has to be in /usr/lib/gnome-screensaver/gnome-screensaver/. When drawing on the root window you don't need XLIB_SKIP_ARGB_VISUALS=1

cat /usr/lib/gnome-screensaver/gnome-screensaver/esheep.sh
#!/bin/sh
electricsheep --root 1 --max-megabytes 3000 --zoom 1 --display-anim 1 --show-errors 0 --nrepeats 2 --frame-rate 30

cat /usr/share/gnome-screensaver/themes/electricsheep.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Name=ElectricSheep
Comment=Electric Sheep is a distributed screen-saver that harnesses idle computers into a render farm with the purpose of animating and evolving artificial life-forms. This module requires a high-bandwidth, always-on connection to the internet such as DSL or cable-modem. The first time you run it, it normally takes 5 to 10 minutes before the first sheep is downloaded and displayed. After that, it should come up immediately. If you have installed the hacked xscreensaver that supports passing key-presses onto the graphics hack and this feature is enabled, then pressing the up arrow-key transmits a vote for the currently displayed sheep to the server. The votes are the basis of a fitness function for an evolutionary algorithm on the sheep genomes. Vote for the sheep you like, and they will mate, reproduce, and evolve! See http://electricsheep.org for more information. This is version 2.6.4.
TryExec=esheep.sh
Exec="esheep.sh"
StartupNotify=false
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Categories=Screensaver

Brian -

I'm the current flam3 developer, working with Spot on the screensaver stuff. I'm sure he'd be interested if you've been able to get this working - I followed your instructions (currently running Dapper) but I couldn't get it work - esheep.sh isn't in the path if it's in gnome-screensaver/gnome-screensaver, so it doesn't show up in the list. Any assistance would be very helpful.

Erik

Folks -

I was able to get the screensaver running under Dapper by putting the esheep.sh file above into the /usr/lib/xscreensaver directory. I'm curious if Edgy moves these files into gnome-screensaver/gnome-screensaver - can someone confirm?

Many thanks for this information. Other than the voting keys, it all works well now.

I took the time to sit down and work through this on relatively clean installs of Ubuntu 6.10 and Debian Etch.

Currently the Edgy electricsheep package puts .desktop files in the following locations
/usr/share/control-center/Desktop/
/usr/share/applnk/System/ScreenSavers/
/usr/share/gnome-screensaver/themes/

The Etch package puts them in
/usr/share/control-center/Desktop/
/usr/share/applnk/System/ScreenSavers/

In Edgy and Etch after installing gnome and kde's screensavers and electricsheep I found screensaver related .desktop files in the following locations:

/usr/share/applications/screensavers/ - holds many screensaver desktop entries in Edgy, doesn't exist in Etch
/usr/share/applnk/System/ScreenSavers/ - holds entries for kscreensaver in Edgy and Etch
/usr/share/gnome-screensaver/themes/ - empty in Ubuntu except for electrichseep, used in Etch for gnome screensavers (ie not xscreensaver hacks)
/usr/share/control-center/Desktop/ - empty in Ubuntu and Etch except for electricsheep
/usr/share/app-install/desktop/ - many desktop files for applications and screensavers in Edgy, doesn't exist in Etch

I'm ignoring the KDE-related ones. To find out where gnome-screensaver looks, I removed all the .desktop files electricsheep installed but one and moved that file through each directory. Each time I moved it I restarted gnome-screensaver and checked to see if electricsheep appeared in the list of screensavers.

/usr/share/gnome-screensaver/themes/ - Edgy no, Etch yes
/usr/share/applications/screensavers/ - Edgy yes, Etch no
/usr/share/control-center/Desktop/ - Edgy no, Etch no
/usr/share/app-install/desktop/ - Edgy no, Etch no

Next I looked for where the actual screensaver executables were located

/usr/lib/gnome-screensaver/gnome-screensaver/ - holds gnome screenavers in Edgy and Etch
/usr/lib/xscreensaver/ - holds xscreensaver hacks in Edgy, doesn't exist in Etch
/usr/bin/ - holds electricsheep

I modified electricsheep.desktop to refer to a wrapper script that simply called electricsheep with a few options, and moved the wrapper script through the above folders to see which locations gnome-screensaver checked when launching a screensaver.

/usr/lib/gnome-screensaver/gnome-screensaver/ - Edgy yes, Etch yes
/usr/lib/xscreensaver/ - Edgy yes, Etch yes
/usr/bin - Edgy no, Etch no

/usr/share/gnome-screensaver/themes was dropped upstream with the start of the 2.15 development version, the generic place for all screensavers is now /usr/share/applications/screensavers
(debian etch has an older gnome than edgy)

the electrisheep package needs updating to use that path

You guys rock... so, combining instructions (using Ubuntu Feisty - to
be released in April), electricsheep FINALLY works again under Gnome,
with gnome-screensaver, and with an ATI video card using the open
driver (ATI Radeon 9200).

I used Brian Pitt's instructions, and then moved (replaced the
existing) electricsheep.desktop file to
/usr/share/applications/screensavers per Oliver Grawer's note above
and VOILA! I'm really happy about this, thanks guys.

You guys rock... so, combining instructions (using Ubuntu Feisty - to
be released in April), electricsheep FINALLY works again under Gnome,
with gnome-screensaver, and with an ATI video card using the open
driver (ATI Radeon 9200).

I used Brian Pitt's instructions, and then moved (replaced the
existing) electricsheep.desktop file to
/usr/share/applications/screensavers per Oliver Grawer's note above
and VOILA! I'm really happy about this, thanks guys.

Well, it does work for the most part, but it stacks up over time. It's almost like gnome-screensaver is firing off the "esheep.sh" script every 10 minutes (the current limit I have set) and the result is ultimately several iterations of electricsheep running on top of one another. After a few hours the machine usually becomes unresponsive to the point of having to just turning off the machine.

If I watch it for a while I'll actually see a second smaller window running on top of the fullscreen electricsheep. Any ideas? Should the esheep.sh script be first checking to see if it's already running? Is this normal behavior for gnome-screensaver?

gnome-screensaver restarts the thing every 10 minutes - this setting can be changed with gconftool in

/apps/gnome-screensaver/cycle_delay

Also, make sure that you 'exec' the electricsheep process in the esheep.sh script - termination will be handled properly.

I am relatively new to Linux and I've been trying to follow along with this thread so that I can understand how to install Electric Sheep.

And I was hoping that someone might sum up what steps I have to do exactly to install it on Ubuntu Edgy Eft.

If you're not willing I'll understand.

On a completely different tangent. I was thinking that if you combined Electric Sheep to work with Beryl's Cube setup.

What I was envisioning was that the top and/or bottom of the cube could be replaced by the Electric Sheep screen saver and then if the computer goes idle after N minutes it would just rotate the cube to the top or bottom.

If running the screensaver all the time would be too intensive you could have black on top and bottom and it becomes active after the computer has gone idle and has rotated to one of the poles.

Loki: There's no easy way to get electricsheep running on edgy. Sorry.

About that beryl idea: You should direct that idea to the original electricsheep developers.

On Feisty, if I use 'exec' in the script, everything works fine, but moving the mouse or hitting a key does not bring up the password dialog. I have to switch to a console and manually kill the process. If I don't use 'exec', moving the mouse works as expected, but I get the problem where 2 instances start after a while. Also, if 'exec' isn't in the script, there are areas of black on the screen where the animation doesn't appear. These sometimes appear in the same location as certain items on my desktop (like the panel clock and another of the applets), but sometimes not.

I just noticed that if I turn compiz off (I had it enabled before), I don't get the black boxes on screen, so it's probably not related to the 'exec' line.

When I launch electric sheep, both manually and with gnome-screensaver, it appears that it is lauching 4 instances of the process right off the bat, is this normal behavior for electric sheep? It seems to work fine, just wondering if i was eating up processing power.

As mentioned at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/electricsheep/+bug/89088/comments/8 , it just doesn't seem to do anything other than spawn some processes that strace show doing nothing but waiting. This is on Hardy.

$ electricsheep
please be patient while the first sheep is downloaded...

I'm not sure that this bug is really a duplicate of #89088.

This bug still exists in 9.04 Beta, electricsheep 2.6.8-9ubuntu1.

This bug was fixed in the package electricsheep - 2.7~b12+svn20091224-1ubuntu1

---------------
electricsheep (2.7~b12+svn20091224-1ubuntu1) lucid; urgency=low

  * Merge from debian testing, (LP: #484013) remaining changes:
    - Merge debian/rules to keep our kscreensaver changes.
  * New upstream version closes (LP: #5823) and (LP: #372040)

electricsheep (2.7~b12+svn20091224-1) unstable; urgency=low

  * New upstream snapshot (Closes: #562230)

electricsheep (2.7~b12+svn20090708-2) unstable; urgency=low

  * Remove contrib script (esheep-mplayer.sh) from previous Debian
    package. (Closes: #546297)
  * debian/control:
    + Add Homepage field
    + Add dependency on mplayer
  * electricsheep.desktop.gnome: Remove obsolete --zoom option
  * electricsheep.desktop: Remove obsolete --zoom option

electricsheep (2.7~b12+svn20090708-1) unstable; urgency=low

  * New upstream release. (Closes: #533652)
  * New maintainer.
  * Move to dehelper compatibility level 5.
  * Update Build-Depends to remove obsolete package. (Closes: #515464)
  * Remove bashism from debian/rules. (Closes: #535377)
  * Remove unneeded dpatch patches.
  * Bump Standards-Version to 3.8.3 (no changes).
  * Clean up *.desktop files.
  * Add empty watch file explaining upstream's "release" policy.
  * Update debian/copyright to reflect new year and new maintainer.
  * Clean up upstream's man page (properly escape hyphens).
 -- Ezra Reeves <email address hidden> Tue, 26 Jan 2010 14:14:25 +0000