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Hey All!

I've tried with 0 success to get the screensaver to load up on the login window.   (set to 1min to speed up testing)

I've tried all the Screensavers, but none will load over the login window. 

However, if a user is logged in, no problem, the screensaver comes right up.

 

It's not the biggest problem, but to save my screens from burning, I set a power setting to put the display to sleep instead.  Students think the Macs are off instead of sitting down to use them and drift off to use a PC.  We run lots of metrics and device use often defines device purchasing. 

Any suggestions or maybe an upcoming patch/update?  I've tried some of the older scripting madness I used to use to overwrite pref/plists etc but those no longer work (really haven't worked well since Catalina).  I'm just stuck. 😥

Screen burn in, isn't really a thing anymore.

Also I believe this just has been broke for a long long time and either nobody has submitted feedback to Apple or they don't care.

We create push a .pkg (folder with some pictures) for our screen saver then run this script to enable the screen saver. 

#!/bin/sh
# Get user logged into console and put into variable "user"
user=`ls -l /dev/console | cut -d " " -f 4`
osMajor=$(sw_vers -productVersion | awk -F"." '{print $2}')
osMinor=$(sw_vers -productVersion | awk -F"." '{print $3}')


sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver CleanExit -string "YES"
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver PrefsVersion -int 100
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver showClock -string "YES"
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver idleTime -int 900


if [[ $osMajor -eq 14 ]] && [[ $osMinor -ge 2 ]]; then

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver moduleDict -dict moduleName -string "iLifeSlideshows" path -string "/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/PlugIns/iLifeSlideshows.appex" type -int 0

else

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver moduleDict -dict moduleName -string "iLifeSlideshows" path -string "/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/Resources/iLifeSlideshows.saver" type -int 0
fi


sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver tokenRemovalAction -int 0

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaverPhotoChooser LastViewedPhotoPath -string ""
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaverPhotoChooser SelectedFolderPath -string "/Library/Application Support/JAMF/JamfCustomApps/ScreenSaver"
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaverPhotoChooser SelectedSource -int 3

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaver.iLifeSlideShows styleKey -string "Classic"

sudo killall -hup cfprefsd

 

We create push a .pkg (folder with some pictures) for our screen saver then run this script to enable the screen saver. 

#!/bin/sh
# Get user logged into console and put into variable "user"
user=`ls -l /dev/console | cut -d " " -f 4`
osMajor=$(sw_vers -productVersion | awk -F"." '{print $2}')
osMinor=$(sw_vers -productVersion | awk -F"." '{print $3}')


sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver CleanExit -string "YES"
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver PrefsVersion -int 100
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver showClock -string "YES"
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver idleTime -int 900


if [[ $osMajor -eq 14 ]] && [[ $osMinor -ge 2 ]]; then

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver moduleDict -dict moduleName -string "iLifeSlideshows" path -string "/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/PlugIns/iLifeSlideshows.appex" type -int 0

else

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver moduleDict -dict moduleName -string "iLifeSlideshows" path -string "/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/Resources/iLifeSlideshows.saver" type -int 0
fi


sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.screensaver tokenRemovalAction -int 0

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaverPhotoChooser LastViewedPhotoPath -string ""
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaverPhotoChooser SelectedFolderPath -string "/Library/Application Support/JAMF/JamfCustomApps/ScreenSaver"
sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaverPhotoChooser SelectedSource -int 3

sudo -u $user defaults -currentHost write com.apple.ScreenSaver.iLifeSlideShows styleKey -string "Classic"

sudo killall -hup cfprefsd

 


Hrm.  I used to run something similar pre-Catalina but Apple changed some stuff and I couldn't get it to work on the login window and wasn't gonna kill myself over it.  I'll give it a test go.  Thanks!

Screen burn in, isn't really a thing anymore.

Also I believe this just has been broke for a long long time and either nobody has submitted feedback to Apple or they don't care.


Since BigSur I haven't been able to call a login screensaver.  Works fine on Catalina.  I know the OLED's and LCD's don't burn burn like CRT's and tubers but they are just on (super bright) ALLLLLLL day/night and I just worry about reduced lifespan, and dimming.  The aluminum iMacs I used to get ghosting sometimes if the login window was up too long so I popped em to sleep.

 

Wish apple would fix their stuff :(

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