>>>> The steps to replicate the desktop icon problem are:
>>>> 1.) Set the screen saver interval to something short like 1 minute
>>>> 2.) Wait for screen saver to activate
>>>> 3.) Move mouse.  Viola, icons are now gone.
>>>>
>>>> Working on this...
>>>
>>> I'm about to return to my testing, but for me, I did not have to wait
>>> for
>>> the screen saver to activate.
>>>
>>> All I needed was to invoke the lock and then immediately restore.
>>>
>>> Darrell
>>
>> You probably have your system configured with a lock delay, correct?
>> The
>> issue seems to be in the code that is triggered before the screen is
>> actually locked with a password.
>>
>> Tim
>
> Never mind, I can't seem to reliably trigger the problem now.  Suffice it
> to say that I am continuing to work on it, and that further testing on
> your end of this problem at this time is likely a waste of time. :-)
>
> Tim

Some additional information: one symptom of this problem is kdesktop_lock
not exiting properly and going zombie, e.g.
ps aux | grep kdesktop_lock
shows something like
user <pid>  1.1  0.0      0     0 ?        Z    14:45   0:00
[kdesktop_lock] <defunct>

This indicates a problem in kdesktop itself.

Tim