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Since my monitor takes an awful lot of time to turn back on after being physically turned off, I'm looking for a command or a simple utility to turn off my screen with a shortcut. Setting a black screensaver is not satisfactory; I want the screen to "hibernate" (the same effect I would get by turning off the computer while leaving the screen physically on).

The same question for Windows: How can I make my screen blank by a shortcut?

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Press STRG a than k and than y –  Daniel Jan 4 '12 at 21:25
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3 Answers

Try using

xset dpms force off

to force the screen to turn off.

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That's really great. For the OP though, when a key is pressed, it turns the screen back on. I'm not sure if that's desirable. –  FakeRainBrigand Jan 4 '12 at 21:18
Sometimes works better if you do sleep 1 ; xset dpms force off otherwise remnants of the last keyboard activity (I guess) sometimes turns the screen back on immediately. –  Mat Jan 4 '12 at 21:19
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up vote 0 down vote accepted

slock locks the screen gracefully.

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I made a file called /home/me/bin/blank and made it executable chmod +x blank with the following in it:

sleep 1; xset dpms force off

Then I set a shortcut in Gnome3 application "keyboard" (gnome-control-center keyboard) to run that script when I push CTRL+ALT+Q.

Man I love linux.

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