August 10, 2022

Linux File Management

Kulwinder Kaurkulwinder3213

DURATION

10min

Introduction

When working on different files, either text based or any language-specific files, it is important to manage these files. In the Linux operating system we have different kinds of file managers which are very easy to use. We can also do the installation using different commands which are there for each file manager.

The operations which are mostly required are copying, moving, deleting, renaming, searching, and changing privileges.

Below are some file managers which are user interface based.
File Management: User Interface System

Thunar
PCManFM
Dolphin
Nautilus

The above mentioned are software developed to make operations easy when we are dealing with different files. We will discuss each manager and its specific benefit.

Thunar

This file manager was designed to be the default file manager for the Xfce desktop environment. It was designed to make file management easy and fast. Thunar is the most preferred file manager. This has additional features which can be used to manage trash and the loading time and navigation is better than other file managers

It is a very efficient and robust file manager for Linux desktop environments.

Thunar can be downloaded using this link: https://gitlab.xfce.org/xfce/thunar

Installation techniques:

Three ways: aptitude, apt-get, apt

1
sudo apt install thunar - y

PCManFM

This is a UI-based free file manager under the standard file managers of LXDE (Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment). PCManFM was developed for Thunar and Dolphin, written from scratch by Hong jen Yee. All the build instructions, configuration, and setup have changed in this.

Some Key Features of PCManFM

Drag and drop support was introduced, volume management, files can be dragged among other directories, and twin panels were also included into PCManFM. It also supports gvfs.

Installation steps:

1
sudo apt - get install - y pcmanfm

Snippet

User interface of PCManFM

Dolphin

This is also a free and open source file manager. Dolphin is included in the KDE applications bundle. It has become the default file manager for KDE-based desktop environments. It replaced Konqueror which was the default file manager for KDE SC, but Konqueror can still be used as an alternative file manager in place of Dolphin.

Some Key Features of Dolphin

Breadcrumb bar, file previews, undo and redo functionality are included. It has sorting and file grouping on the basis of different categories which makes most things easier. It also has a file Indexer which is useful for file searching.

Official website: https://apps.kde.org/dolphin/

Installation steps:

and then

After the installation, search for Dolphin and the home screen will be seen as:

Command for updating Dolphin

Command for removing Dolphin

Nautilus

This file manager is the official file manager of GNOME desktop. This version has replaced Midnight Commander of GNOME 1.4 and until now has been the default file manager for GNOME. Nautilus was released under GNU Lesser Public License.

Its files internally rely on the file system layer which is provided by GVfs for fetching all the remote and local files. It keeps track of local file modification in real time. Its version also includes file compression and decompression.

Key Features of Nautilus

It keeps a history of visited folders in real time and allows quick revisiting of all those folders. Audio files can be previewed when the mouse pointer is hovered over (like a YouTube hovering pointer over video thumbnail).

Official website: https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Files

Repositories can be downloaded from: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/nautilus