Description of problem: Starting with a configuration in which an external screen is the only active display, and then disconnecting the external screen, sometimes fails to cause the internal laptop screen to become active. The result is that the GUI desktop is not displayed until the external screen is reconnected. The impact is that suspending the machine and removing it from its dock (to which the external screen is attached) and resuming it leaves the machine stuck in a nearly useless configuration without a graphical display. The only way I've found to recover from this is restart the display manager (or simply reboot). Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): Fedora 29. I never saw this with Fedora 25-28. How reproducible: This is a sporadic issue that seems to happen perhaps one time in 5 (i.e., every 10 times the laptop is disconnected from its external screen it is left without an active display roughly twice.) Steps to Reproduce: 1. Connect laptop to external display and log in to an account configured to use the external display only (and turn off the internal display). 2. Suspend the laptop to RAM and remove it from the dock, thereby disconnecting the external display. 3. Wake the laptop from suspend. Usually the display appears on the laptop's internal screen, but sometimes it doesn't. Actual results: Sporadically the laptop is left without a visible GUI desktop. Expected results: GUI desktop always becomes visible on the laptop's internal display when no other display is connected. Additional info: Laptop is a Dell Latitude E7240 with Intel on-chip graphics and 1366x768 built-in display. External display is a 4096x2160 (UHD) TV connected via the DisplayPort on a Dell dock. OS is Fedora 29 running Plasma as the desktop. The GUI is normally configured via the Plasma graphical Settings utility to use only the external screen when the laptop is docked. When the failure occurs, the laptop's OS is still alive. It's possible to switch to a text console on the laptop (Ctrl+Alt+F3) and log in. Running 'DISPLAY=:0 xrandr' gives the following output: Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1366 x 768, maximum 8192 x 8192 eDP-1 connected primary (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 1366x768 60.00 + 40.00 1280x720 60.00 59.99 59.86 59.74 1024x768 60.04 60.00 960x720 60.00 928x696 60.05 896x672 60.01 1024x576 59.95 59.96 59.90 59.82 960x600 59.93 60.00 960x540 59.96 59.99 59.63 59.82 800x600 60.00 60.32 56.25 840x525 60.01 59.88 864x486 59.92 59.57 700x525 59.98 800x450 59.95 59.82 640x512 60.02 700x450 59.96 59.88 640x480 60.00 59.94 720x405 59.51 58.99 684x384 59.88 59.85 640x400 59.88 59.98 640x360 59.86 59.83 59.84 59.32 512x384 60.00 512x288 60.00 59.92 480x270 59.63 59.82 400x300 60.32 56.34 432x243 59.92 59.57 320x240 60.05 360x202 59.51 59.13 320x180 59.84 59.32 HDMI-1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DP-1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) HDMI-2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DP-1-1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DP-1-2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DP-1-3 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) I believe I recall that switching repeatedly between virtual consoles (Ctrl+Alt+Fx) can crash the GUI, which brings the GDM login screen up on the laptop's display. It's not clear to me that xrandr is at fault here, but if the bug isn't in xrandr itself then it's likely to be in something that relies on it.
An update to the original bug: It happens in GNOME, too. However, it seems to be less severe: If I switch to a text console (ctrl+alt+f3) and back (ctrl+alt+f2) I get the GDM login screen which prompts for my password. Typing that gets me back to the desktop, which is still showing the session that was running when I suspended the machine.
This message is a reminder that Fedora 29 is nearing its end of life. Fedora will stop maintaining and issuing updates for Fedora 29 on 2019-11-26. It is Fedora's policy to close all bug reports from releases that are no longer maintained. At that time this bug will be closed as EOL if it remains open with a Fedora 'version' of '29'. Package Maintainer: If you wish for this bug to remain open because you plan to fix it in a currently maintained version, simply change the 'version' to a later Fedora version. Thank you for reporting this issue and we are sorry that we were not able to fix it before Fedora 29 is end of life. If you would still like to see this bug fixed and are able to reproduce it against a later version of Fedora, you are encouraged change the 'version' to a later Fedora version prior this bug is closed as described in the policy above. Although we aim to fix as many bugs as possible during every release's lifetime, sometimes those efforts are overtaken by events. Often a more recent Fedora release includes newer upstream software that fixes bugs or makes them obsolete.
Fedora 29 changed to end-of-life (EOL) status on 2019-11-26. Fedora 29 is no longer maintained, which means that it will not receive any further security or bug fix updates. As a result we are closing this bug. If you can reproduce this bug against a currently maintained version of Fedora please feel free to reopen this bug against that version. If you are unable to reopen this bug, please file a new report against the current release. If you experience problems, please add a comment to this bug. Thank you for reporting this bug and we are sorry it could not be fixed.