.copy is not working on Linux X11

[gauravkumar37]

• Using the latest commit on Linux with X11 display server, .copy is not working and nothing happens, not even after quitting the app.
• Using Linux Majaro with 6.5.5-1 kernel on X11 with KDE as the desktop environment
• echo ok | xclip -selection clipboard -i this works

[sigoden]

This feature has been around for a long time, and no one has reported bugs. I've tried it myself and found no problem.
Is there something wrong with your operation？ Can you do it again based on the picture?

[gauravkumar37]

Yes, tried again like in the picture.
I think this may be because of 1Password/arboard#114

[gauravkumar37]

Ok, tried with the library arboard on local. Here's my debugging steps, not super familiar with rust but I think this has something to do with text reference vs actual data?

use std::time::Duration;

use arboard::Clipboard;

fn main() {
    copy("this does not work");

    let mut clipboard = Clipboard::new().unwrap();
    clipboard.set_text("this works").unwrap();

    // give it a second to sync with clipboard before exiting the program
    std::thread::sleep(Duration::from_secs(1));
}

pub fn copy(src: &str) {
    let mut clipboard = Clipboard::new().unwrap();
    clipboard.set_text(src).unwrap();
}

[gauravkumar37]

Aah, got it, you need some delay in the function copy. This fixes it:

use std::time::Duration;

use arboard::Clipboard;

fn main() {
    copy("this was not working earlier but now works");

    let mut clipboard = Clipboard::new().unwrap();
    clipboard.set_text("this works").unwrap();

    // give it a second to sync with clipboard before exiting the program
    // std::thread::sleep(Duration::from_secs(1));
}

pub fn copy(src: &str) {
    let mut clipboard = Clipboard::new().unwrap();
    clipboard.set_text(src).unwrap();

    std::thread::sleep(Duration::from_secs(1)); // <-- this is the fix
}

Used aichat to debug aichat :-)

[sigoden]

Is 1 second is enough? or 100 milliseconds is enough?
Is delay related to the length of the content?
Moreover, aichat supports config.auto_copy. Long delay will affect the user experience.

It is better to wait for arboard to fix related problems.

[gauravkumar37]

auto copy is also not working and I think this is why: clipboard is being initialized inside the copy function every time. So before it has a chance to actually copy (asynchronously) data to OS clipboard, the clipboard is dereferenced because copy function returns.
The timeout was just a band-aid fix. Actual fix is to extract out the clipboard out of the copy function and only initialize it once.

use std::time::Duration;

use arboard::Clipboard;

fn main() {
    let mut clipboard = Clipboard::new().unwrap();

    copy(&mut clipboard, "hello");

    // give it a second to sync with clipboard before exiting the program
    // only needed in this test cli, not in aichat
    std::thread::sleep(Duration::from_secs(1));
}

pub fn copy(clipboard: &mut Clipboard, src: &str) {
    clipboard.set_text(src).unwrap();
}

[sigoden]

cloud you test #161 for me?

[gauravkumar37]

Works like a charm. Also tested the auto_copy feature, that is also working. Thanks for such a wonderful tool and also for providing a fix so promptly 🚀

[sigoden]

You're welcome and thank you for your contribution.