Nautilus acting up

Thu Dec 8 12:58:31 UTC 2016

On 7 December 2016 at 23:27, rikona <rikona at sonic.net> wrote:

>> Google it.
>
> I did, but the things I found were for different problems/desires
> where people wanted to specifically change how the desktop behaved,
> and changed multiple things in doing so.

I think perhaps you are not using a good choice of keywords when
you're searching, then.

E.g. if I wanted to know how to install Nemo on Ubuntu 16.04 and make
it manage the desktop, I would try...

"nemo" "ubuntu 16.04" "unity" "replace nautilus"

That's a real example. I have not tried it before posting. I just tried it.

The 1st hit looks irrelevant. Hits #2 & #3 are exactly what I need:
step-by-step instructions on how to configure it.

Things to focus on:

* exact product names
* version numbers.
* restrictive verbs

E.g. I don't care what version of Nemo -- whatever is current. But I
need instructions for my version of Ubuntu, so that's important.

The quote marks mean I want only pages with all of those words.

The quoted _phrase_ restricts it to my specific version of Ubuntu.

Good Google skills are a major 21st century life skill. Not just for
Ubuntu, for anything.

> Some were about bug 1570243,

No human-written text description. Vague. It crashed. So, probably a
noob who doesn't really know what they're doing. Ignore it.

> This is presented in a bit more clear way, and has additional useful
> warnings/comments. Thanks. Your comment below helped me to understand
> part of what 'control' means, which was not clear.

Thanks.

But do not Ralf's comments as well.

> Just wanted to be very clear. Installing the KDE desktop was a
> disaster. I didn't want to do anything like that.

Again, Google. E.g.

"can i install nemo without cinnamon"

First 2 hits directly relevant.

>>> The only choice was 'unlock', which I didn't do - it seems that it was
>>> already put on the launcher following installation/run.
>
>> Not normally, AFAIK, no. Either you already had it there or you
>> didn't remove Nautilus' icon first.
>
> The steps were: 1- check if nemo was installed [it was not], 2- remove
> Files icon from the launcher, 3 - install nemo using 'Software', 4 -
> run nemo, 5 - nemo icon appears in the bar, 6 - right-click its icon
> on the bar, 7 - the only choice at that point was 'unlock'. The icon
> seems to be working properly...

It sounds like you had Nemo installed previously.

Remove an app, its icon disappears. This is reasonable: it's gone. Not
there any more.

But if you reinstall it, a _locked_ icon comes back again. Because it
is there once again.

> I really don't like it! Some of those features are very nice to have.
> One of the reasons I installed some KDE software was to get pgms that
> HAVE a good set of useful features.

Well, I understand that, but honestly, I switched from KDE to GNOME 2
in 2004 and I've never looked back.

In all that time, I've needed *one* KDE app. K3B, the CD-burning tool.
It was better than anything GNOME had. But I don't use it any more as
I don't use optical disks much any more. My Mac doesn't even have an
optical drive.

> When I was checking this out I DID find most of the things you
> mentioned about history etc. You did not need to tell me those things.
> My original question was WHY is Nemo called 'Files' instead of Nemo -
> as in why did they do that?

Not sure!

Nemo is Nautilus with extra features. GNOME 3.6 renamed "Nautilus" to
"Files". Unity is based on GNOME 3, so I guess it inherits the name.

I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, they're all silly names, but
Files is the most descriptive. Still not great. "GNOME File Manager"
would be better IMHO.

People understand codenames versus real names, e.g. Ubuntu 16.04 is
"Xenial Xerus" and the UK Conservative Party is known as the Tories
while the US Republican Party are the GOP. People can follow that
stuff.

So the GNOME File Manager, codenamed "Nautilus" seems fair enough...
but no, the change is more pervasive.

> That part I also knew from looking for konq, no longer in the
> repositories, and is listed in few places now - I use both on
> occasion. I mentioned that because the icons often have a form of the
> actual name - which I find useful and informative. Dolphin seems like
> a dumbed-down konq. :-)

Konqueror was a do-it-all tool. File manager, web browser, FTP client
and much more. I don't like that. I like smaller tools with
clearly-defined roles.

Konqueror used a library called KHTML to render web pages.

Then Apple forked KHTML and called the result WebKit. They improved it
a lot, so KDE abandoned KHTML and adopted WebKit. Konqueror is now
based on WebKit instead, AIUI.

Konqueror also got a bit big and slow to be the default file manager
so someone wrote a new one -- Dolphin -- that is just that and nothing
else.

But I switched away from KDE about 12y ago and never use it any more.
It's too big, too complicated and too fiddly for my tastes -- and
although it is very very customisable, it is not good at things I
want, such as a vertical taskbar.

The rapid development seems to be in the Gtk side of the fence, so I
mostly use only Gtk desktops and tools. They mix-and-match better.

There is a new, second Qt desktop coming: LXQt.

It's the next version of the formerly Gtk-based LXDE, which I don't
mind -- it's lightweight and fast and fairly simple. LXDE has merged
with Razor-Qt, a lightweight Qt-based desktop, and the result will be
LXQt. It's not ready yet but it has promise.

Maybe it will tempt me back to KDE-land.

> Aha - the only drive icon I have is trash, and Nautilus does indeed
> come up. Normally I don't have drive icons - I get there via a FM.

Hmmm. OK. Have you turned off desktop and launcher drive icons, then?

> Pretty easy to tell visually, since I set them up differently...

OK. It isn't for me. I don't tend to customise a lot. I switch
computers too often for that.

>> Press F2 to rename. Press Ctrl-A to "select all" if you want the file
>> extension as well. Press Ctrl-C to copy the name.
>
>> Go to the new file. Press F2 to edit. Press Ctrl-A to Select All if
>> you want to change the extension too. Press Ctrl-V to paste.
>
> Yep - that's one of a few different ways I tried to copy/paste - none
> of them work.

That's very weird. That method, with tiny variations, has been working
for me for about 25 years on Windows 3, 9x, 2K, XP, Vista, 7, 8 and
10, Classic MacOS, Mac OS X, KDE, GNOME 2, GNOME 3, Unity, Xfce and
LXDE. It's universal.

If copy and paste works, this works.

Everywhere, always.

>> That's OK, but please, try to find answers yourself with Google and
>> Wikipedia before asking?
>
> I do - but I also know you'll NEVER believe that. :-) You have a great
> deal of knowledge and experience - you know the subject in breadth as
> well as depth. Many things that are obvious to you are not evident to
> a lowly user such as my self. For me, it is a tool, NOT a job. A new
> problem really is new to me - I have to learn what I can do to fix it.
> You can probably select better search words than I can because of your
> expertise. The first part of my learning is usually to learn enough to
> do better searches for a good answer. I have, many times, suggested
> that others search for knowledge that I know well - what I observe is
> that initially I can usually pick better search techniques than they
> can because of my knowledge - for example tpmde in the context of
> biochemistry.

(?)

http://acronyms.thefreedictionary.com/TPMDE

OK, point taken, but if you don't want to get under the hood, then
don't go to great lengths to customise your Linux setup.

Try all the main distros/desktops, pick one that is good enough, and
learn to live with it.

It makes life _much_ easier.

I switch between Windows 10 and Ubuntu 16.04 on this laptop -- both
have roles. (Windows not very often, I admit!)

My desktop runs Mac OS X  10.11.

I don't customise any of them a lot -- I just learn their quirks. It's
easier to adapt me than adapt them.

> I have an automobile, but I certainly don't know as much as an auto
> engineer or an excellent mechanic. I may learn enough to fix my car,
> but each 'fix' is new, and what I learn is only a somewhat incomplete
> fraction of what the engineer knows. Not as complex as computers, but
> a similar thing.
>
> The right extra sentence or two from you might save hours of time for
> someone else, and is much appreciated.

Well, thank you for saying that. It really is much appreciated.

I know I am sometimes too grumpy but I do try to help. It's my way to
pay back the community for the FOSS software I use every single day.

-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
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