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Before I begin, this is not a duplicate of keyring-did-not-get-unlocked-when-you-logged-into-your-computer because I have not enabled auto-login

And it is not a duplicate of stop-being-prompted-to-unlock-the-default-keyring-on-boot because, when its legit, I don't mind this prompting me.

My issue

When I log into my ubuntu & gnome-based linux laptop, I enter/click my username, plop in my password and all is fine. Several seconds pass, and my desktop appears and I am good to go. There is no mention of any keyrings, it all happens behind the wizards curtain. I believe the keyring is automatically unlocked during the login process.

However, when I login using biometrics - in this case, with my face using the rather excellent howdy tool for ubuntu - also fedora/arch, after several seconds my desktop appears, and all would appear to be fine, just like above...

  • And then, an annoying modal dialog keeps popping up (1) ... again & again if I press cancel. enter image description here

So, I have to enter my password anyway (defeating the purpose of giving the peter-griffin to my camera, which has now become a look), or get annoyed and press cancel a number of times before it goes away.

Solution/what I did so far

I thought that the cause of my problem is obviously howdy - but the github repo has closes the issue as not being a fault of the tool itself, but the OS - speifically the keyring and how it seems to be closely coupled with the login password.

Howdy is otherwise seemlessly integrated into ubuntu - so the solution cannot be to remove it, because, aside from this irritation, its great! sudo works with my face (when it recognises it, I've set the bar quite high!) instead of password, falling back to password if face-recognition fails; in fact everything works - and until I happened to reboot my box for the first time in days, it was perfect. But then on that first successful face scan at the login-screen I discovered this.

  • I don't want to turn off the keyring,
  • I'm not auto-logging in but am get prompted to enter my password anyway,
  • It seems like keyrings thinks I am auto-logging in.

The solution has to be simple, I'm sure? Some configuration, .conf magic and a touch of engineering glue, I just can't quite figure it out and whether it will need a change in howdy, or said change in some configuration?

Does someone more knowledgeable with ubuntu (and probably gnome, since thats my flavour) have any config ideas that may help?

For all intents, I have "bypassed" password login - but I haven't bypassed security. And there is a difference, hence my first sentence urging you not to mark the post as duplicate, because it's not.

Any suggestions? I am really not familiar with keyrings (or is it gnome-keyrings?) - I have found a post detailing how to unlock a different keyring other than the "Login" keyring on login, which was suggested as a similar question to mine - but it specifically says not auto-login, and I get the feeling my biometric howdy login is being treated as though it is an auto-login (rather than an alternative, secure passwordless login).

EDIT: I am asking this post here, because as you may see from this issue, one of several on the boltgolt github repo the keyring is getting all of the blame. It's just not howdy's fault, the devs say. So I am wondering is there anything specific to ubuntu configuration that can help me?

Given that there several related posts to the keyring here such as keyring-did-not-get-unlocked-when-you-logged-into-your-computer

Noscere
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  • Hang about. Stop that bus, I need a pee-pee! I think I might have encountered a user on the github repo who has this issue, so the howdy team are on the case! – Noscere Dec 14 '22 at 04:06
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    Only Ubuntu and official flavors of Ubuntu (https://ubuntu.com/download/flavours) are on-topic here, refer to https://askubuntu.com/help/on-topic where you'll find other SE sites where you question will be welcome if you don't want to use a Zorin forum. (One advantage of Ubuntu is it's many support options, you opted for Zorin so take advantage of it's support options, or SE Unix & Linux) – guiverc Dec 14 '22 at 04:08
  • @guiverc sorry - I stated I use Zorin because its curtesy to provide as much information as possible about one's set up. To be clear, this is generic to ubuntu keyring - and the guys at boltgolt who make the ubuntu howdy tool (Its not a zorin tool) have closed prior issues raising this as a bug (or, I would say, feature request for) in the ubuntu's keyring from the Passwords and Encryption keys

    Since you pointed it out, and in hindsight not relevent - I'll remove reference to Zorin (a rare occasion where more info was less

     – Noscere Dec 14 '22 at 04:21
  • The keyring gets decrypted with a key, which is usually set to the the password, picked up when you use a password to login. Biometric login does not provide a password, so no key to decrypt the keyring, so it has to ask, so it may do its thing. Fingerprint readers have the same issue. – ubfan1 Dec 14 '22 at 04:39
  • @guiverc as an aside, if I did go to the zorin forum, those guys might cry - since I've effectively turned my installation into full blown ubuntu. From a goal of wanting to have gnome-tweaks on the XFCE I started with, I'm running gnome, not a trace of XFCE and I've ended up with an apt sources list that is 99% pure ubuntu - the only thing "zorin" is the kernel, the cold-boot splash screen (over which I have an animated laughing skeletor from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe) and a couple of themes (that I don't use anyway, I like the rather funky gnomedows 11 theme! – Noscere Dec 14 '22 at 04:44
  • @ubfan1 I meant to ask that in my list of questions, whether this applies to fingerprint readers - because if that were to be the case (and you say it is) then this will surely get picked up as more and more laptops come equiped with the capability and a fix can then happen.

    I guess what I am really wondering is, can it be addressed/worked around by configuration - or is this needing code changes to the keyring tool(s)? Like the proverbial bear, I don't mind going around the (code)mountain to see-what-he-can-see.

    I'm without work for several days, and this itch has to be scratched

     – Noscere Dec 14 '22 at 04:47
  • @ubfan1 do you know if its the Launcher -> Password -> Passwords & Encryption Keys , PGP, GPG keys etc? (Thank goodness I have Aspergers not dslexia. As if just allowing us to hate TLAs would have been good enough for cruel god)

    Nevermind - itsfoss has decided to be my friend shudder what sort of gawd-awful CMS puts a period as the last character in a URI?

     – Noscere Dec 14 '22 at 04:53
  • I meant to say, is it the launcher-> etc etc etc AKA the thing based on seahorse?, in my last comment – Noscere Dec 14 '22 at 05:05
  • I think so, but it's been years since I've looked at this, so things might have changed. – ubfan1 Dec 14 '22 at 17:08

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