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Create a Monitor Power-Off Shortcut
Posted by Kevin Purdy at 9:30 PM on December 14, 2007
If you're using a Linux-powered laptop with limited battery life, or you just want to darken your laptop screen for whatever reason, Tombuntu has a tip for you. To turn the monitor off and have it wake up at the touch of a mouse or key, create a shortcut using this command, or type it into a terminal:
sleep 1 && xset dpms force off(Note: The "sleep 1 && " portion is only necessary for terminal commands). Any laptop can be set to darken its monitor after a certain amount of time, but even the quickest setting—15 minutes on mine—uses precious battery life if you need to look away. Adding this shortcut to a panel button or menu could come in handy.
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solarusdude
Posted 12:21 PM 14/12/07
Steve Gibson at www.grc.com made a small application for Windows that does pretty much the same thing. It's called Wizmo. Check it out at: [www.grc.com]
solarusdude
thor222
Posted 11:26 AM 14/12/07
@holymogwai: Yep, but for some laptops that vent heat through the keyboard, that might not be a great idea. Also, maybe it's just me but not having to close the lid of my laptop to do this is useful...
thor222
holymogwai
Posted 7:22 AM 14/12/07
Well even laptop users can just set it in the power options to turn the monitor off when they close the lid...
holymogwai
Therevan
Posted 6:26 AM 14/12/07
@holymogwai: I was waiting for that! I tried to make it clear this was a laptop-specific tweak, but you're right -- desktop users can save more power by using their finger.
Therevan
holymogwai
Posted 6:22 AM 14/12/07
My monitor has a similar feature. It's called a power button.
holymogwai
EchoD
Posted 5:55 AM 14/12/07
Mac OS X has a similar feature. I believe the wait interval is related to how long you've set it to keep the display on. (Corrections, please).
I set my display to sleep after one minute, so the display dims between 30s and 55s. If I'm actively at my computer, and it's connected to a power source, I'll use Caffeine ( [lightheadsw.com] ) to keep the display on. But, when I'm back and forth or running from the battery, I disable Caffeine.
EchoD
blueskiesgus
Posted 9:35 PM 18/12/07
I just get errors when I try to do this on my Linux laptop.
blueskiesgus