Making Ubuntu - Jaunty Gnome Environment a little more friendly for those who remember „old Gnome”¶

Gnome: Ubuntu Home Folder on desktop - where is it?¶

It’s not in Gnome Desktop distributed with Ubuntu.

I really liked home icon on my desktop but in new version (9.04) of Ubuntu I can’t find it.

The easiest way to enable it back is, running these commands (gconftool-2):

gconftool-2 --type boolean --set /apps/nautilus/desktop/home_icon_visible true
gconftool-2 --type string --set /apps/nautilus/desktop/home_icon_name "Home folder"

Where is the trash icon?¶

It has been also disabled by Ubuntu developers :( - if you want it back just run:

gconftool-2 --type boolean --set /apps/nautilus/desktop/trash_icon_visible true

For more possible tweaks of Gnome Desktop you can checkout gconf-editor software, or try to navigate of settings tree from command line (gconftool-2 -R /).

More interesting tweaks¶

If you’re searching for interesting tweaks to your Gnome Desktop you should checkout this entry Gconf - gnome desktop on steroids [EN] or the same in Polish Gconf - a czy ty wiesz jak podrasowac swoj pulpit

Gnome: system wide changing „default action” application¶

Exact procedure is described in post Changing default applications, but it’s done for all users of computer. This is done by few easy steps:

• edit /usr/share/applications/defaults.list

• find your entry for example application/pdf=kpdf.desktop and change kpdf.desktop to „something else”

• remember that „something else” must be in /usr/share/applications

Gnome: Changing „default application” per user¶

For making user specific change You have to edit file: $HOME/.local/share/applications (syntax is the same as in system wide config). If your application doesn’t have an .desktop entry you can easily create it.

Adding custom application support to Gnome (integrating new software)¶

Creating .desktop file¶

At the begining you have to create .desktop file which describes application lunch procedure.

Register new file type in Gnome¶

Specific informations can be found at system admin guide for version 2.26.

Creating new mime type support in Gnome¶

Specific informations can be found at system admin guide for version 2.26.

I hope this article is easy to understand - because it is my first public article in English.