Setting File Manager Preferences
Use the File Management Preferences dialog to customize the file manager.
To display the File Management Preferences dialog, choose Edit →
Preferences. You can also access this dialog directly from the top panel menubar
by choosing System → Preferences → File Management.
You can set preferences in the following categories:
Default settings for views
Behavior of files and folders, executable text files, and
Trash
Information that is displayed in icon captions and the date
format
Columns that appear in the list view and their order
Preview options to improve the performance of the file manager
How removable media and connected devices are handled
File Manager Views
You can specify a default view, and select sort options and display
options. You can also specify default settings for icon views and list views.
To specify your default view settings, choose Edit → Preferences.
Click the Views tab. The following table lists the Views preferences that
you can modify.
Table 18 Views Preferences | |
View new folders using
| Determines the default view for folders. When you open a folder, the
folder is displayed in the view that you select: the icon view, the list view,
or the compact view, which is a variant of the icon view that is organized
in columns rather than rows.
|
Arrange items
| The characteristic by which you want to sort the items in folders that
are displayed in this view.
|
Show hidden and backup files
| Displays files that are not shown in folders. For more information about
hidden files, see Viewing Hidden Files.
|
Default zoom level in the Icon View, Compact View, or List View sections
| Sets the default zoom level for folders that are displayed in this view.
The zoom level specifies the size of items in a view.
|
Use compact layout
| Arranges the items in icon view so that the items in the folder are
closer to each other.
|
Text beside icons
| Places the icon captions for items beside the icon rather than under
the icon.
|
All columns have the same width
| Ensures that all columns in a compact view have the same width.
|
Show only folders
| Displays this option to display only folders in the Tree in the side
pane.
|
|
Files and Folders Behavior
To set your preferences for files and folders, choose Edit → Preferences.
Click the Behavior tab. You can set the preferences described in the following
table.
Table 19 Behavior Preferences
| |
Single click to open items
| Performs the default action for an item when you click the item. When
this option is selected and you point to an item, the title of the item is
underlined.
|
Double click to open items
| Performs the default action for an item when you double-click the item.
|
Open
each folder in its own window
| Sets the default
to spatial mode rather than to browser mode.
Spatial mode enables you to browse files and folders as objects in their own window.
Otherwise, you must navigate the files and folders as objects in the same window.
|
Run executable text files when they are opened
| Runs a text executable file when you choose the file. An executable
text file is a text file that can execute, that is, a shell script.
|
View executable text files when they are opened
| Displays the contents of an executable text file when you choose it.
|
Ask each time
| Displays a dialog when you choose an executable text file. The dialog
asks whether you want to execute the file or display the file.
|
Ask before emptying the Trash or deleting files
| Displays a confirmation message before the Trash is emptied, or files
are deleted.
|
Include a Delete command that bypasses Trash
| Adds a Delete menu item to the following menus: When you select an item and then choose Delete, the item is deleted
from the file system. You cannot recover a deleted file.
|
|
File Manager Display
An icon caption displays the name of a file or folder in an icon view.
The icon caption also includes three additional items of information on the
file or folder. The additional information is displayed after the file name.
Normally only one item of information is visible, but when you zoom in on
an icon, more of the information is displayed. You can modify what additional
information is displayed in icon captions.
To set your preferences for icon captions, choose Edit → Preferences.
Click the Display tab.
Select the items of information that you want to display in the icon
caption from the three drop-down lists. The following table describes the
items of information that you can select.
| |
None
| Displays no information for the item.
|
Size
| Displays the size of the item.
|
Type
| Displays the description of the MIME type of the item.
|
Date Modified
| Displays the last modification date of the item.
|
Date Accessed
| Displays the date that the item was last accessed.
|
Owner
| Displays the owner of the item.
|
Group
| Displays the group to which the item belongs.
|
Permissions
| Displays the permissions of the item as three sets of three characters,
for example, -rwxrw-r--.
|
Octal Permissions
| Displays the permissions of the item in octal notation, for example,
764.
|
MIME Type
| Displays the MIME type of the item.
|
Location
| Displays the
full UNIX pathname of the item.
|
Restore
| Indicates whether
the item is present on the file system and verifies whether its contents are
changed when viewed in a ZFS snapshot by using Time Slider.
|
|
The date Format option enables you to choose how the date is displayed
throughout the file manager.
List Columns
You can specify the information that is displayed in list view in file
manager windows. You can specify which columns are displayed in list view,
and the order in which the columns are displayed.
To set your preferences for list columns, choose Edit → Preferences.
Click the List Columns tab.
To specify a column to display in list view, select the option that
corresponds to the column, and then click Show. To remove a column from the
list view, select the option that corresponds to the column, and then click
Hide.
Use the Move Up and Move Down buttons to specify the position of columns
in list view. To use the default columns and column positions, click Use Default.
The following table describes the columns that you can display.
| |
Name
| Displays the name of the item.
|
Size
| Displays the size of the item.
|
Type
| Displays the description of the MIME type of the item from the File
Types and Programs preference tool.
|
Date Modified
| Displays the last modification date of the item.
|
Date Accessed
| Displays the date on which the item was last accessed.
|
Group
| Displays the group to which the item belongs.
|
MIME type
| Displays the MIME type of the item.
|
Octal Permissions
| Displays the permissions of the item in octal notation, for example,
764.
|
Owner
| Displays the owner of the item.
|
Permissions
| Displays the permissions of the item as three sets of three characters,
for example, -rwxrw-r--.
|
Restore Information
| Indicates whether the item is present on the file system and verifies
if its contents are changed when viewed in a ZFS snapshot using Time Slider.
|
|
File Manager Preview
The file manager include some file preview features. The preview features
can affect the speed with which the file manager responds to requests. You
can modify the behavior of some of these features to improve the speed of
the file manager. For each preview preference, you can select one of the following
options.
|
|
Always
| Performs the action for both local files, and files on other file systems.
|
Local Files Only
| Performs the action for local files only.
|
Never
| Never performs the action.
|
Visualize ZFS
snapshots timeline
| Specifies whether
you are able to view previous snapshots of a folder in its File Manager window,
using the View → Restore menu item.
|
|
To set your preview preferences, choose Edit → Preferences. Click
the Preview tab.
The following table lists the preview preferences that you can modify.
Table 20 Preview Preferences | |
Show text in icons
| Specifies when to preview the content of text files in the icon that
represents the file.
|
Show thumbnails
| Specifies when to show thumbnails of image files. The file manager stores
the thumbnail files for each folder in a .thumbnails directory
in the user's Home folder.
|
Only for files smaller than
| Specifies the maximum file size for files for which the file manager
creates a thumbnail.
|
Preview sound files
| Specifies when to preview sound files.
|
Count number of items
| Specifies when to show the number of items in folders. When in icon
view, you might need to increase your zoom level to see the number of items
in each folder.
|
|
Media in the File Manager
You can configure how the file manager handles removable media and devices
that are connected to the computer, such as music players or cameras. For
each media format or device type, the file manager offers to run one of the
applications that are known to support this format, as well as the following
options.
| |
Ask what to do
| Asks for the desired action when the media or device appears.
|
Do Nothing
| Does nothing
|
Open Folder
| Treats the media or device like an ordinary folder and opens it in a
file manager window.
|
Open with other Application
| Displays the file manager application chooser dialog, so you can select
an application to run. Note that applications known to handle the media or
device can be chosen directly from the drop-down list.
|
|
The most common media formats can be configured in the Media Handling
section: audio CDs, video DVDs, music players, cameras, and software CDs.
To configure the handling for other media formats, first select the
format in the Type drop-down list, and then select the desired handling for
this format in the Action drop-down list.
The following table lists other media handling preferences that you
can modify.
Table 21 Media Preferences | |
Never prompt or start programs on media insertion
| Prevents the file manager from showing dialogs or running programs when
media or devices appear. When this option is selected, the preferences for
handling of specific media formats are ignored.
|
Browse media when inserted
| The file manager will automatically open a folder when media is inserted.
This setting applies only for media formats for which the handling has not
been explicitly configured.
|
|