{"id":1131,"date":"2021-09-10T05:29:29","date_gmt":"2021-09-10T04:29:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/?p=1131"},"modified":"2026-06-14T17:25:23","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T16:25:23","slug":"taking-a-screenshot-of-a-menu-in-cinnamon-linux","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/2021\/09\/10\/taking-a-screenshot-of-a-menu-in-cinnamon-linux\/","title":{"rendered":"Taking a screenshot of a menu in Cinnamon (Linux)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The normal method of taking a screenshot in Linux (in Cinnamon, at least) does not work<\/em><\/strong> while selecting a menu command is in progress. Example from selecting menu \u201cSheet\u201d<\/em> → \u201cFill Cells\u201d<\/em> → \u201cFill Series\u201d<\/em> in LibreOffice<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

All keyboard input, including the key combinations for taking screenshots<\/a> and Alt<\/kbd> + Tab<\/kbd> to switch to another application, are completely blocked<\/em><\/strong> while menus are open.<\/p>\n

Solution<\/h1>\n

A solution is to delay the screenshot a number of seconds, giving enough time to select the menu command. ImageMagick’s<\/a> ‘import’<\/a> command, which is installed by default on Ubuntu MATE 20.04<\/a> (Focal Fossa), is one such program that can do this.<\/p>\n

Synthesising the required options from the documentation is non-trivial (for instance, “-delay” does not do anywhere near what is expected and “-pause”<\/a> needs to be combined with “-window” (see below)), but the solution is:<\/p>\n

\r\nimport -pause 10 -window root  someScreenshotWithAMenu2.png\r\n<\/pre>\n
The result is in file someScreenshotWithAMenu2.png and can further be manipulated in e.g. Krita<\/a> (as this will capture the entire screen – both screens if on a two-monitor system).<\/p>\n
Note: Without “-window root”<\/em> the error message is “import-im6.q16: unable to grab mouse `’: No such file or directory @ error\/xwindow.c\/XSelectWindow\/9187.”<\/em> and nothing is saved.<\/p>\n
Alternatives<\/h1>\n
The built-in application “Screenshot” in Debian\/Ubuntu\/Ubuntu MATE 20.04<\/a> (Focal Fossa) (Win + “screen” → “Screenshot”) can also delay the screenshot for a number of seconds. The option is “Grab after a delay of”<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The normal method of taking a screenshot in Linux (in Cinnamon, at least) does not work while selecting a menu command is in progress. Example from selecting menu \u201cSheet\u201d → \u201cFill Cells\u201d → \u201cFill Series\u201d in LibreOffice: All keyboard input, …<\/p>\n
  Taking a screenshot of a menu in Cinnamon (Linux)<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17,45,23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1131"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1131"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1131\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1146,"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1131\/revisions\/1146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pmortensen.eu\/world2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}