GDM "Lock screen" item fails to lock down.
 

I have Gnome GDM on SuSE 10.0 brand new installation, but oh sadly sad,
the "Lock screen" menu item fails to lock the desktop. It merely launches the saver screens,
and when any keyboard key is pressed, the login prompt box never shows up, and the
open desktop comes back up directly. In other words, the desktop did not get locked up.

What gives? How do I repair this?

Cheers. . .

maybe you are not checking the password required field in the screen-server setup dialog box.

also there is a section called "similar threads" at the bottom of this page. see if it gives you some insights to solving your problem.

nope, nope.

nope, nope.

what kinda response is that?

That kind of response comes from the prestigious, though quite intricate, American Gumpian philosophy (after the late 20th Century United-Statesian renowned pragmatic philosopher, the illustrious son of Greenbow, Alabama.) :D

:confused::confused:phew! it look like you're more into literature than Linux. have fun while you're abroad.:Pengy:

May be you were logged in as root, and gnome doesn't allow to lock screen as root (xscreensaver security feature ;-). If you also have kde installed, try this (from inside gnome, as root) :
kdesktop_lock --forcelock

Script to do the needful
 

Following is the script tweaked to do the needful. Hope this helps. :)

Run this as root.

WARNING: Don't forget to set password of the account "mihir" before trying to execute it.

#!/bin/bash

xhost +local:
su mihir -c gnome-screensaver
su mihir -c "gnome-screensaver-command --lock"

--Mihir Nimbalkar