Firefox pdf plugin not remembering download directory and moving files from /run/user/XXX deletes them without a trace

[Keith]

On 11/8/23 11:54 AM, Josef Wolf wrote:
> On Wed, Nov 08, 2023 at 02:01:08PM +0100, Oliver Grawert wrote:
>> hi,
>> Am Mittwoch, dem 08.11.2023 um 13:07 +0100 schrieb Josef Wolf:
>>> When a pdf file is previewed in foirefox, the pdf previewer offers a
>>> button to
>>> save the file. In older installs (e.g. ubuntu-18.04, maybe prior to
>>> snap?) the
>>> dialog activated by this button remembered the directory that was
>>> selscted in
>>> previos invocations. It even remembered the directory dependant on
>>> the site
>>> the file was downloaded from.
>>>
>>> In ubuntu-22.04, this dialog always resets to something like
>>> /run/user/1000/XXXX/YYYY, so one has always to manually navigate to
>>> the last
>>> download directory that was used last time.
>>>
>>> Even worse: when I noticed this fact, I ran:
>>>
>>>    $ cd /some/dir/very/deep/into/the/file/hierarchy
>>>    $ find /run/user/1000 -name '*.pdf' -print0 | xargs -0 mv -t .
>>>
>>> to move those files to the directory they belong.
>>>
>> uh, rather do not do that since the files in /run are just mirroring
>> the file names ...
>>
>> snaps (including firefox) use flatpaks xdg-desktop-portals to store
>> files if you do not use the snap home interface ... there is some
>> documentation at:
>>
>> https://snapcraft.io/docs/xdg-desktop-portals#heading--portal-vs-home
>>
>> and here s the upstream doc:
>>
>> https://flatpak.github.io/xdg-desktop-portal/
> 
> Uh!
> 
> Then, this "feature" should be disbaled/vanished completely, alltogether!
> 
> Such insane behaviour shoud net be enabled by default at all!
> 
> Myself was with linux/ubuntu for decades now. Never seen such insanity! Looks
> like I should look out for some snap-free alternative...
> 
> 

I use the Firefox snap with 22.04.3, and I don't see the behavior you're 
experiencing. On my system, Firefox works for me just as the way you 
described how the earlier non-snap versions worked for you.

-- 
Keith