Thanks Robin for your answer. Let me take your points in reverse order debian unstable I believe that my getting the ffmpeg from debian-multimedia this issue has been solved I dont get all this :-) All I know is I am using gnome which sometimes seems to be using metacity. Can I replace xsession by metacity?

On 11/04/2010 07:54 PM, Rustom Mody wrote: You could try, metacity can run without Gnome. Best, Jeremy

On Fri, Nov 5, 2010 at 12:38 AM, Robin Gareus <robin(a)gareus.org> wrote: Ok so I installed xfce4. Made my shell script as follows: #!/bin/bash set -x # Set up nested X server Xephyr -keybd ephyr,,,xkbmodel=evdev -br -reset -host-cursor -screen 1280x720x24 -dpi 96 :2 & sleep 3 export DISPLAY=:2.0 xfce4-session Now I get the error: ./sh1 + sleep 3 + Xephyr -keybd ephyr,,,xkbmodel=evdev -br -reset -host-cursor -screen 1280x720x24 -dpi 96 :2 SELinux: Disabled on system, not enabling in X server Kbd option key () of value ((null)) not assigned! Ignoring device from udev. Ignoring device from udev. Ignoring device from udev. Ignoring device from udev. Ignoring device from udev. Ignoring device from udev. Ignoring device from udev. + export DISPLAY=:2.0 + DISPLAY=:2.0 + xfce4-session ** ERROR **: Another session manager is already running aborting... Backtrace: 0: Xephyr (xorg_backtrace+0x3b) [0x81d910b] 1: Xephyr (0x8048000+0x194bc5) [0x81dcbc5] 2: (vdso) (__kernel_rt_sigreturn+0x0) [0xb77ee40c] 3: Xephyr (0x8048000+0x3871f) [0x808071f] 4: Xephyr (0x8048000+0x389c8) [0x80809c8] 5: Xephyr (0x8048000+0x341cb) [0x807c1cb] 6: /lib/i686/cmov/libc.so.6 (__libc_start_main+0xe6) [0xb7361c76] 7: Xephyr (0x8048000+0x19081) [0x8061081] Segmentation fault at address (nil) Fatal server error: Caught signal 11 (Segmentation fault). Server aborting ./sh1: line 7: 10053 Aborted xfce4-session

On Fri, 2010-11-05 at 00:24 +0530, Rustom Mody wrote: FWIW, the procedure I used for my screencasts was: 1) Install the "openbox" window manager 2) Log out of your desktop, and log back in to an "Openbox Session" from GDM, rather than a full GNOME session 3) Right-click on the desktop and use the menu to launch a terminal 4) Run Xephyr -- this command is a little different to the command from the tutorial page, because the original command was segfaulting for me: Xephyr -keybd ephyr,,,xkbmodel=evdev -screen 1280x720x24 -dpi 96 :2 5) Start the nested X session: DISPLAY=:2 /etc/X11/Xsession Thanks Leigh

On Fri, Nov 5, 2010 at 3:08 PM, Jeremy Jongepier <jeremy(a)autostatic.com> wrote: Makes no diff: Another session manager is already running is the error Yes the keybd options cause problems sometimes and sometimes not Well!! Out here man Xephyr gives me hardly one screenful: the only options mentioned are screen parent and host-cursor. It however says its like xnest. So install Xnest and look at its man page. No keybd options there either. But it says see Xserver. So I see Xserver. Nothing there either Anyway for now I am dropping the keybd and session call and that runs. Script is: #!/bin/bash #set -x # Set up nested X server Xephyr -ac -screen 1024x768x16 -host-cursor -br -reset -terminate 2> /dev/null :2 & sleep 3 export DISPLAY=:2.0 #xfce4-session& I am now at the point of calling the second script. The jack_capture is giving its own share of problems so try to only get video with the ffmpeg call #!/bin/bash DATE=`date +%Y%m%d` TIME=`date +%Hh%M` export DISPLAY=:2.0 # Start screencast #xterm -display :0.0 -e jack_capture -b 24 $HOME/screencast/screencast_audio_$DATE-$TIME.wav & ffmpeg -an -f x11grab -r 30 -s 1280x720 -i :2 -vcodec libx264 -vpre lossless_ultrafast -threads 4 $HOME/screencast/screencast_video_$DATE-$TIME.mkv #killall jack_capture Error I get is [x11grab @ 0x9e04c30] device: :1 -> display: :1 x: 0 y: 0 width: 1280 height: 720 [x11grab @ 0x9e04c30] shared memory extension found X Error of failed request: BadMatch (invalid parameter attributes) Major opcode of failed request: 130 (MIT-SHM) Minor opcode of failed request: 4 (X_ShmGetImage) Serial number of failed request: 11 Current serial number in output stream: 11 [1]+ Segmentation fault Xephyr -ac -screen 1024x768x16 -host-cursor -br -reset -terminate :2 2> /dev/null As far as I know I am not using gnome (now). At initial gdm login I choose xfce rather than gnome session

On 11/05/2010 01:07 PM, Rustom Mody wrote: Hello Rustom, You're right, the man page of Xephyr doesn't provide a lot of info as Xephyr doesn't have that much options by itself. So the Xephyr man page being informative almost sounds cynical, sorry about that, not my intention. I got the usage info of this parameter from Xephyr --help, TinyX section. then I found out it didn't work for me so I started googling and came upon setting this specific option which works in my case. That is because you're trying to capture a 1280x720 screensize with ffmpeg while the Xephyr screensize is 1024x768. Best, Jeremy

Well the seg fault has gone but now I am getting [x11grab @ 0x9bb2c30] device: :2 -> display: :2 x: 0 y: 0 width: 1024 height: 768 [x11grab @ 0x9bb2c30] shared memory extension found [x11grab @ 0x9bb2c30] All info found [x11grab @ 0x9bb2c30] Estimating duration from bitrate, this may be inaccurate Input #0, x11grab, from ':2': Duration: N/A, start: 1288979305.393176, bitrate: 754974 kb/s Stream #0.0, 1, 1/1000000: Video: rawvideo, bgra, 1024x768, 1/30, 754974 kb/s, 30 tbr, 1000k tbn, 30 tbc /home/siva/screencast/screencast_video_20101105-23h18.mkv: No such file or directory Tried sticking in a -t in at different points in the command line to no effect