Logs out or suspends?

 Logs out - this would be a bug with the X server crashing
 Suspends - this would be a question of gnome-power-manager policy and there's probably already a bug discussing it

I am logged out in a sense of locking - password dialog is shown, session still runs in the background (no programs closed as would happen with an X server crash).

I disabled suspend because I find it annoying aswell. :-) (Changed the action to "Nothing" for laptop lid close action)

> password dialog is shown

But only to enter a password, not to choose a user first, right? 
That would mean that you are not logged out, but that the system is locked.

Yes. Sorry if I described it in odd ways

GNOME Shell isn't handling the lid-close action, reassigning to gnome-power-manager.

(In reply to comment #5)
> GNOME Shell isn't handling the lid-close action, reassigning to
> gnome-power-manager.

gnome-power-manager? I doubt you'll find anything in gnome-power-manager that fits that description.

I heard in Gnome 3.4, there will be no longer a suspend when the laptop lid is closed and an external screen is attached. Similarly (IMHO), there should also be no screen locking as seems to be happening now, since it's comparably counter-productive for the same reasons suspending isn't senseful in that situation.

There are a couple of workarounds to this bug I have discovered. There is this extension: https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/241/yet-another-inhibit-suspend-extension-user-menu/. OR you can go into brightness and lock and turn lock off  for when screen turns off. I have done this and in gnome tweak tool I have set laptop lid close action to nothing. The gnome tweak tool thing alone does not work. I would not say the laptop lid close action is stupid but the way to get it disabled is too complicated without disabling gnome-screensaver or installing an inhibit extension. It seems the brightness and lock config does not respect laptop lid close action in gnome tweak tool / gsettings. That is the real bug here.

Your suggestions are IMHO not very helpful because I don't want to turn screen lock off generally. Screen lock on laptop lid close is helpful for mobile use (without external screens).

No screen lock for lid action "Nothing" would be not a good idea because there is no lid close action "Lock screen". The screen lock is IMHO an independent option from the laptop lid action, since it can be used in various senseful combination with it (e.g. screen lock when blanking the screen), and that should stay.

But the screen lock should be limited to the useful case: I close my laptop in regular mobile use to finish my work and wander off

And it should be disabled in the senseless/"stupid" (my personal opinion) case: I have an external screen attached and just don't need the internal one -> instead of clicking myself through gnome 3 settings to disable the screen I am doing the natural thing: closing the laptop lid to deactivate it, sadly followed by a brainless screen lock on my external screen.

You can already work around that with the:
org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power lid-close-suspend-with-external-monitor
GSetting.

Way to get yourself in the developer's good books with that subject line...

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 657201 ***

Hm. I'm honestly confused now: how does being able to force a suspend on lid close solve this:

Experienced behaviour:
- Closing lid with no external screen: suspend
- Closing lid with external screen: no suspend, but screen locked on external screen (which isn't very useful - sorry for using 'stupid' here, it was a really poor emotional choice of word)

Wanted behaviour:
- Closing lid with no external screen: suspend
- Closing lid with external screen: no suspend, no lock, no nothing

I don't see how the bug you duplicated against is related to this.

This bug is not a duplicate indeed.  The wanted behavior for bug 657201 is:
- Closing lid with no external screen: suspend
- Closing lid with external screen: suspend

This is a bug in the lid-close action "Nothing", whose behavior (according to Jonas) really can be described as "Lock screen".

Unfortunately I don't have permission to reopen this bug.

To emphasize this, there should continue to be a screen lock combined with the suspend. I don't want to activate the screen lock entirely. Also, with no external screen, the screen should be locked on lid close aswell. *ONLY* if an external screen is attached and I close the lid, there should be no screen lock since the external screen is still there and I want to use it.

(In reply to comment #11)
> Hm. I'm honestly confused now: how does being able to force a suspend on lid
> close solve this:
> 
> Experienced behaviour:
> - Closing lid with no external screen: suspend
> - Closing lid with external screen: no suspend, but screen locked on external
> screen (which isn't very useful - sorry for using 'stupid' here, it was a
> really poor emotional choice of word)

The patch in bug 692282 checks whether we would have suspended before blanking, or locking the screen, so if you have an external screen, as we wouldn't have suspended anyway, you won't get a screen lock, or blanking.

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 692282 ***