Energy Saver - Putting Computer to Sleep

I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive.
TaliesinSoft wrote on :

In the System Preferences Energy Saver panel one can opt to put the computer to sleep after a given length of inactivity. I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive. It appears to me that if I have an application other than Finder open but not being used that the application is considered to be active. Is that really the case?

I run my SuperDuper! backups in the middle of the night. When each backup completes a Growl notification appears on the desktop and states whether a particular run was successful or failed. Clicking on the notification causes it to disappear. But it seems that until I perform such a click that the computer is considered to be active and will not automatically go to sleep after the specified period of inactivity.

A semi work around is to schedule Energy Saver to put the computer to sleep at a given time. My preference would be to have the sleep occur at a given lapse after the completion of the backups which, depending on my day's activity, can vary in the length of time taken.

David Stone replied on :

In article 0001HW.C59386040018055BB01AD9AF@redacted.invalid, TaliesinSoft taliesinsoft@redacted.invalid wrote:

In the System Preferences Energy Saver panel one can opt to put the computer to sleep after a given length of inactivity. I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive. It appears to me that if I have an application other than Finder open but not being used that the application is considered to be active. Is that really the case?

You can have an application open and in the foreground, and the computer can still go to sleep provided there are no operation generating disk, keyboard, or mouse activity - but see below for a caveat.

I run my SuperDuper! backups in the middle of the night. When each backup completes a Growl notification appears on the desktop and states whether a particular run was successful or failed. Clicking on the notification causes it to disappear. But it seems that until I perform such a click that the computer is considered to be active and will not automatically go to sleep after the specified period of inactivity.

Alerts/dialogs generally have to be dismissed before the computer is considered to be inactive. Does the backup software have an option to automatically dismiss the dialog/alert after a set period of time?

Alexander Wasmuth replied on :

In comp.sys.mac.system TaliesinSoft wrote:

In the System Preferences Energy Saver panel one can opt to put the computer to sleep after a given length of inactivity. I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive. It appears to me that if I have an application other than Finder open but not being used that the application is considered to be active. Is that really the case?

Since moving to Leopard the auto-sleep function seems not to be that reliable anymore. With Tiger I could move my hands away from the keyboard/mouse and the computer would go to standby at almost the exact second the idle period had passed.

With 10.5 the screen blanking does work, but if the computer then also goes into standby mode seems totally random to me.

Since 10.5.6 there are some entries in the syslog that could give a hint to the problem's cause, e.g.

Jan 14 07:12:56 elmo kernel[0]: PM notification cancel (pid 33, configd) Jan 14 07:12:57 elmo kernel[0]: IOPMrootDomain: idle cancel

but until now I couldn't figure out the exact reason for the insomnia.

If you browse the Apple support forums you will find plenty of threads covering the same problem.

Alex

TaliesinSoft replied on :

On Wed, 14 Jan 2009 12:19:45 -0600, David Stone wrote (in article no.email-81FFDA.13194514012009@redacted.invalid):

In article 0001HW.C59386040018055BB01AD9AF@redacted.invalid, TaliesinSoft taliesinsoft@redacted.invalid wrote:

In the System Preferences Energy Saver panel one can opt to put the computer to sleep after a given length of inactivity. I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive. It appears to me that if I have an application other than Finder open but not being used that the application is considered to be active. Is that really the case?

You can have an application open and in the foreground, and the computer can still go to sleep provided there are no operation generating disk, keyboard, or mouse activity - but see below for a caveat.

I run my SuperDuper! backups in the middle of the night. When each backup completes a Growl notification appears on the desktop and states whether a particular run was successful or failed. Clicking on the notification causes it to disappear. But it seems that until I perform such a click that the computer is considered to be active and will not automatically go to sleep after the specified period of inactivity.

Alerts/dialogs generally have to be dismissed before the computer is considered to be inactive. Does the backup software have an option to automatically dismiss the dialog/alert after a set period of time?

Many thanks for replying!

The SuperDuper! notifications are through an applet called Growl which has quite a few parameters that one can select from, including the length of the display Unfortunately my preference is to not dismiss the notifications automatically so that the status of my backups is showing when I wake the computer. So it looks like I have to live with the scheduled as opposed to the automatic sleep.

Tom Anderson replied on :

On Wed, 14 Jan 2009, TaliesinSoft wrote:

In the System Preferences Energy Saver panel one can opt to put the computer to sleep after a given length of inactivity. I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive. It appears to me that if I have an application other than Finder open but not being used that the application is considered to be active. Is that really the case?

My understanding is that it's mouse and keyboard activity. That's all. I could well be wrong.

I run my SuperDuper! backups in the middle of the night. When each backup completes a Growl notification appears on the desktop and states whether a particular run was successful or failed. Clicking on the notification causes it to disappear. But it seems that until I perform such a click that the computer is considered to be active and will not automatically go to sleep after the specified period of inactivity.

I've had the exact opposite experience - my machine going to sleep in the middle of a powerpoint presentation!

tom

Kurt Ullman replied on :

In article Pine.LNX.4.64.0901142117020.4005@redacted.invalid, Tom Anderson twic@redacted.invalid wrote:

I've had the exact opposite experience - my machine going to sleep in the middle of a powerpoint presentation!

My experience has been more that the audience goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

Nick Naym replied on :

In article 0001HW.C59386040018055BB01AD9AF@redacted.invalid, TaliesinSoft at taliesinsoft@redacted.invalid wrote on 1/14/09 1:07 PM:

In the System Preferences Energy Saver panel one can opt to put the computer to sleep after a given length of inactivity. I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive. It appears to me that if I have an application other than Finder open but not being used that the application is considered to be active. Is that really the case?

I run my SuperDuper! backups in the middle of the night. When each backup completes a Growl notification appears on the desktop and states whether a particular run was successful or failed. Clicking on the notification causes it to disappear. But it seems that until I perform such a click that the computer is considered to be active and will not automatically go to sleep after the specified period of inactivity.

A semi work around is to schedule Energy Saver to put the computer to sleep at a given time. My preference would be to have the sleep occur at a given lapse after the completion of the backups which, depending on my day's activity, can vary in the length of time taken.

The only app that seems to keep my iMac awake when I want to put it asleep is Safari: I get a dialog asking if I really want to quit Safari.

That doesn't mean it won't happen with other apps, it just hasn't seemed to happen, And I'm not sure what happens when the Scheduled Sleep kicks in, as I've got that set for the wee, wee hours of the morning, well after I'm done working on the iMac (and well after my scheduled SuperDuper! and final TM backup has finished), and I've quit most (but not all) apps. My impression is that -- with the exception of Safari -- unless an app is actually "actively doing something" (i.e., say, Entourage, which is set to download messages every 5 minutes), then I can leave it running without interfering with Sleep.

Barry Margolin replied on :

In article Pine.LNX.4.64.0901142117020.4005@redacted.invalid, Tom Anderson twic@redacted.invalid wrote:

I've had the exact opposite experience - my machine going to sleep in the middle of a powerpoint presentation!

I think it's trying to tell you something. Or maybe they just want you to switch to Keynote.

Steven Fisher replied on :

In article <C593D4E3.2D581%nicknaym@redacted.invalid[remove_this].gmail.com>, Nick Naym <nicknaym@redacted.invalid[remove_this].gmail.com> wrote:

The only app that seems to keep my iMac awake when I want to put it asleep is Safari: I get a dialog asking if I really want to quit Safari.

If Safari is asking if you want to quit, you're logging out or shutting down, not going to sleep.

(And yes, I just checked this.)

Nick Naym replied on :

In article sdfisher-6417D8.18492814012009@redacted.invalid, Steven Fisher at sdfisher@redacted.invalid wrote on 1/14/09 9:49 PM:

In article <C593D4E3.2D581%nicknaym@redacted.invalid[remove_this].gmail.com>, Nick Naym <nicknaym@redacted.invalid[remove_this].gmail.com> wrote:

The only app that seems to keep my iMac awake when I want to put it asleep is Safari: I get a dialog asking if I really want to quit Safari.

If Safari is asking if you want to quit, you're logging out or shutting down, not going to sleep.

(And yes, I just checked this.)

And yes, you're right. ;) ... I confused my "sleep" experience with my "log out" experience. Thanks for clarifying it...otherwise, my post would've been horribly misleading to James.

(Sorry for screwing up, James. :( )

Daniel Cohen replied on :

Tom Anderson twic@redacted.invalid wrote:

On Wed, 14 Jan 2009, TaliesinSoft wrote:

In the System Preferences Energy Saver panel one can opt to put the computer to sleep after a given length of inactivity. I'm seeking a clarification of just when the computer is considered to be inactive. It appears to me that if I have an application other than Finder open but not being used that the application is considered to be active. Is that really the case?

My understanding is that it's mouse and keyboard activity. That's all. I could well be wrong.

I thought it was that display sleep occurs in there is no mouse or keyboard activity, and computer sleep if there is no mouse, keyboard, or hard drive activity.

My iMac running Leopard doesn't seem to want to sleep the computer unless I do it manually. I've looked at a couple of programs that are supposed to sleep the computer when Energy Saver fails to do so, but both of them seem to look at keyboard and mouse activity only.

Matthew Russotto replied on :

In article Pine.LNX.4.64.0901142117020.4005@redacted.invalid, Tom Anderson twic@redacted.invalid wrote:

I've had the exact opposite experience - my machine going to sleep in the middle of a powerpoint presentation!

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

Richard Maine replied on :

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article Pine.LNX.4.64.0901142117020.4005@redacted.invalid, Tom Anderson twic@redacted.invalid wrote:

I've had the exact opposite experience - my machine going to sleep in the middle of a powerpoint presentation!

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

A study attempting to prove this failed to be completed because nobody could stay awake to verify that everyone else was asleep.

Nick Naym replied on :

In article 1itl8hz.1yerscdtsqd76N%nospam@redacted.invalid, Richard Maine at nospam@redacted.invalid wrote on 1/15/09 5:08 PM:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article Pine.LNX.4.64.0901142117020.4005@redacted.invalid, Tom Anderson twic@redacted.invalid wrote:

I've had the exact opposite experience - my machine going to sleep in the middle of a powerpoint presentation!

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

A study attempting to prove this failed to be completed because nobody could stay awake to verify that everyone else was asleep.

How do we know ("If a tree falls in the forest...")?

Thomas R. Kettler replied on :

In article 1itl8hz.1yerscdtsqd76N%nospam@redacted.invalid, nospam@redacted.invalid (Richard Maine) wrote:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article Pine.LNX.4.64.0901142117020.4005@redacted.invalid, Tom Anderson twic@redacted.invalid wrote:

I've had the exact opposite experience - my machine going to sleep in the middle of a powerpoint presentation!

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

A study attempting to prove this failed to be completed because nobody could stay awake to verify that everyone else was asleep.

They tried to get funding for the study, but that also failed since they couldn't find anyone interested enough in PowerPoint presentations to fund it.

Fred Moore replied on :

In article 1itl8hz.1yerscdtsqd76N%nospam@redacted.invalid, nospam@redacted.invalid (Richard Maine) wrote:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote:

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

A study attempting to prove this failed to be completed because nobody could stay awake to verify that everyone else was asleep.

I just love recursivity!

To the original issue, I think it's any USB activity, not just the mouse and keyboard. So printers, iPods, external HDs, scanners, etc. can keep a machine up at nights if they're active.

TaliesinSoft replied on :

On Fri, 16 Jan 2009 11:48:07 -0600, Fred Moore wrote (in article fmoore-04724B.12480716012009@redacted.invalid):

To the original issue, I think it's any USB activity, not just the mouse and keyboard. So printers, iPods, external HDs, scanners, etc. can keep a machine up at nights if they're active.

I posted elsewhere in this thread that I had determined that the inability for the computer to automatically sleep after a SuperDuper! backup was due to the optional Growl notification that informs one of the success or failure of a backup. The cause seems to be that the notification waits for a click on it to be dismissed. I have now, with some reluctance, disabled the notifications and now the computer does go to sleep upon completion of those middle of the night SuperDuper! backups.

Tom Stiller replied on :

In article fmoore-04724B.12480716012009@redacted.invalid, Fred Moore fmoore@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article 1itl8hz.1yerscdtsqd76N%nospam@redacted.invalid, nospam@redacted.invalid (Richard Maine) wrote:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote:

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

A study attempting to prove this failed to be completed because nobody could stay awake to verify that everyone else was asleep.

I just love recursivity!

Is that anything like "recursion"?

Nick Naym replied on :

In article 0001HW.C59626620007F0F2B01AD9AF@redacted.invalid, TaliesinSoft at taliesinsoft@redacted.invalid wrote on 1/16/09 12:56 PM:

On Fri, 16 Jan 2009 11:48:07 -0600, Fred Moore wrote (in article fmoore-04724B.12480716012009@redacted.invalid):

To the original issue, I think it's any USB activity, not just the mouse and keyboard. So printers, iPods, external HDs, scanners, etc. can keep a machine up at nights if they're active.

I posted elsewhere in this thread that I had determined that the inability for the computer to automatically sleep after a SuperDuper! backup was due to the optional Growl notification that informs one of the success or failure of a backup. The cause seems to be that the notification waits for a click on it to be dismissed. I have now, with some reluctance, disabled the notifications and now the computer does go to sleep upon completion of those middle of the night SuperDuper! backups.

Growl (in General Prefs) allows you to determine how long (if at all) the notification remains on screen....at least, that's how I've been interpreting those notification option boxes.

TaliesinSoft replied on :

On Fri, 16 Jan 2009 13:11:03 -0600, Nick Naym wrote (in article <C59645F7.2DC99%nicknaym@redacted.invalid[remove_this].gmail.com>):

[responding to my commenting that it was Growl notifications that prevented my computer from automatically going to sleep]

Growl (in General Prefs) allows you to determine how long (if at all) the notification remains on screen....at least, that's how I've been interpreting those notification option boxes.

I'm very aware of that setting, well, er, uh, as of a couple of days ago. I liked receiving a Growl notification informing me whether or not a given SuperDuper! scheduled run had successfully completed. The problem is that the SuperDuper! runs were at 3:00 a.m. and I normally don't use my computer til more like 8:00 a.m. and I didn't want to leave the computer awake for something like four hours. I could set the Growl notifications to dismiss themselves after a short time, but by the time I checked in there would be no sense in having them at all. So that's why I finally decided to give up the Growl notifications.

Nick Naym replied on :

In article 0001HW.C5964A45000E6B41B01AD9AF@redacted.invalid, TaliesinSoft at taliesinsoft@redacted.invalid wrote on 1/16/09 3:29 PM:

On Fri, 16 Jan 2009 13:11:03 -0600, Nick Naym wrote (in article <C59645F7.2DC99%nicknaym@redacted.invalid[remove_this].gmail.com>):

[responding to my commenting that it was Growl notifications that prevented my computer from automatically going to sleep]

Growl (in General Prefs) allows you to determine how long (if at all) the notification remains on screen....at least, that's how I've been interpreting those notification option boxes.

I'm very aware of that setting, well, er, uh, as of a couple of days ago. I liked receiving a Growl notification informing me whether or not a given SuperDuper! scheduled run had successfully completed. The problem is that the SuperDuper! runs were at 3:00 a.m. and I normally don't use my computer til more like 8:00 a.m. and I didn't want to leave the computer awake for something like four hours. I could set the Growl notifications to dismiss themselves after a short time, but by the time I checked in there would be no sense in having them at all. So that's why I finally decided to give up the Growl notifications.

Well, the obviously obvious alternative (besides the scheduling of a fixed Sleep time), of course, would be to extend the lapse time and/or to do away with with any SD! schedule at all, and just manually tell SD! to make a backup just prior to calling it a night.

I have my SD! backup scheduled to run at 1 AM, and the have scheduled Sleep for 3 AM, with the computer and display activity lapse sliders both set for "never" and the Screen Saver set to kick in after 45 minutes. Since I usually don't get to bed until nearly 2 AM, I don't have the same Growl problem you're experiencing. (Of course, were I to start hitting the hay earlier, I'd reset my SD! and Sleep schedules accordingly.)

TaliesinSoft replied on :

On Fri, 16 Jan 2009 15:31:20 -0600, Nick Naym wrote (in article <C59666D8.2DCB9%nicknaym@redacted.invalid[remove_this].gmail.com>):

[continuing in our back and forth regarding SuperDuper!, Growl notification, and scheduled sleep (sleep for the computer, that is).

Well, the obviously obvious alternative (besides the scheduling of a fixed Sleep time), of course, would be to extend the lapse time and/or to do away with with any SD! schedule at all, and just manually tell SD! to make a backup just prior to calling it a night.

I have my SD! backup scheduled to run at 1 AM, and the have scheduled Sleep for 3 AM, with the computer and display activity lapse sliders both set for "never" and the Screen Saver set to kick in after 45 minutes. Since I usually don't get to bed until nearly 2 AM, I don't have the same Growl problem you're experiencing. (Of course, were I to start hitting the hay earlier, I'd reset my SD! and Sleep schedules accordingly.)

A bit of a problem with not scheduling SuperDuper! is that currently I have two backups run each evening, one of my primary (internal) drive and one of my secondary (external) drive. Interestingly one can schedule two drives to occur at the same time and they will actually be run in sequence, the second starting immediately upon completion of the first. Running the two backups manually would mean having to stay up until the first one completed. Another advantage of the sleep when there is no activity approach is that the times taken by the two backups vary from day to day depending on what I have done, and there is no need to allow for what one thinks may be the needed length of time for the two to complete. So, as things now stand the tradeoff is that I have to take about a minute in the morning to launch SuperDuper! and check to see that the runs completed successfully.

Fred Moore replied on :

In article tom_stiller-970934.13333916012009@redacted.invalid, Tom Stiller tom_stiller@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article fmoore-04724B.12480716012009@redacted.invalid, Fred Moore fmoore@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article 1itl8hz.1yerscdtsqd76N%nospam@redacted.invalid, nospam@redacted.invalid (Richard Maine) wrote:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote:

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

A study attempting to prove this failed to be completed because nobody could stay awake to verify that everyone else was asleep.

I just love recursivity!

Is that anything like "recursion"?

Well, if I look up 'recursivity' in Apple's dictionary, it takes me directly to a Wikipedia article on recursion. However, just in case you're thinking 'They're just correcting slang or misnomer with a link to the real word', at the bottom of that article is a Wiktionary link to recursivity. That link produces an article which claims 'recursivity' is a synonym to 'recursiveness', with 'recursion' as only a related term. I confess I'm not qualified to swing that meat ax to split those hairs.

Gee, I'm glad it's Friday! Now I can spend the whole weekend in recursive contemplation. Or is that contemplative recursion?

Hang on! I can see my tail coming into view right now...

;)

Matthew Russotto replied on :

In article tom_stiller-970934.13333916012009@redacted.invalid, Tom Stiller tom_stiller@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article fmoore-04724B.12480716012009@redacted.invalid, Fred Moore fmoore@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article 1itl8hz.1yerscdtsqd76N%nospam@redacted.invalid, nospam@redacted.invalid (Richard Maine) wrote:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote:

Everyone goes to sleep in the middle of powerpoint presentations.

A study attempting to prove this failed to be completed because nobody could stay awake to verify that everyone else was asleep.

I just love recursivity!

Is that anything like "recursion"?

Recursivity: The quality of having recursivity.