1 <page xmlns="http://projectmallard.org/1.0/"
6 <link type="guide" xref="index#display-management"/>
9 <title>User Switching</title>
12 <em>User switching</em> is a method of running more than one session at a time on a <link xref="seat">seat</link> and switching between them.
13 Only one session can be used at a time.
14 The session is switched by contacting the display manager using D-Bus and calling the one of the following method on the Seat object:
19 SwitchToGreeter - A greeter session is started. This allows the user to authenticate for a new session or authenticate to return to their current session.
24 SwitchToUser - If there is a session for the given user then it is switched to, otherwise a greeter is started.
29 SwitchToGuest - If a guest session is active it is switched to, otherwise a guest session is started.
34 Switching is performed using <em>virtual terminals</em> in the kernel.
35 Each session has a separate display server and the selected session is activated by changing the active virtual terminal.