Gnome screensaver has the wrong keyboard layout

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Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 Service Pack 2
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 Service Pack 2

Situation

The system is installed with one keyboard layout, and the passwords for user and root have been entered with this layout. In Gnome a second keyboard layout has been added to facilitate input in a different language, which is incompatible with the default layout (for example, the default layout uses Latin characters and the second layout uses Cyrillic)

While the desktop is switched to the second layout, the screensaver activates. Since the active keyboard layout is incompatible with the layout used to enter the password, it is impossible to type in the correct password.

Resolution

In SLEx11, the screensaver password dialog has a visible option to switch the keyboard layout, but in SLE10 this option is hidden. If both the left and the right alt-keys are pressed simultaneously, the keyboard layout is changed to the other configured layout.

Disclaimer

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