Inhibit gnome screensaver for a given program

gnome-inhibit

#!/bin/bash
# Note: Doesn't work anymore (at least for Gnome 3.34, possibly later; see Python script instead)
# Usage: gnome-inhibit <command-line>
# Example: gnome-inhibit mpv video.mp4

cookie=$(dbus-send \
  --session \
  --dest=org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver \
  --type=method_call \
  --print-reply=literal \
  --reply-timeout=20000 \
  /org/freedesktop/ScreenSaver \
  org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver.Inhibit \
  "string:$1" "string:gnome-inhibit" | awk '{print $2}')

uninhibit() {
  dbus-send \
    --session \
    --dest=org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver \
    --type=method_call \
    --print-reply=literal \
    --reply-timeout=20000 \
    /org/freedesktop/ScreenSaver \
    org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver.UnInhibit uint32:$cookie
  echo "Screensaver uninhibited (cookie:$cookie)"
}

echo "Screensaver inhibited (cookie:$cookie)"
trap uninhibit EXIT
"$@"

gnome-inhibit.py

#!/usr/bin/python
# coding=utf-8
# Usage: gnome-inhibit <command-line>
# Example: gnome-inhibit mpv video.mp4

import subprocess
import dbus
import sys
import os

bus = dbus.SessionBus()
proxy = bus.get_object('org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver','/org/freedesktop/ScreenSaver')
iface = dbus.Interface(proxy, 'org.freedesktop.ScreenSaver')
cookie = iface.Inhibit(sys.argv[1], "gnome-inhibit")
print("Inhibiting screensaver (pid: %d)" % os.getpid())
print("Executing: %s" % subprocess.list2cmdline(sys.argv[1:]))

subprocess.check_call(sys.argv[1:])

Excellent clean example of how to do this, thanks for sharing!

Only place I could find it. Thanks!

Updated with a Python version - now apparently the Inhibit is released when the process dies, which means dbus-send cannot be used.