Dolphin - make left window active

English Applications
#1

Hi all,

I generally use dolphin as a file manager under KDE 4.4.1.

This is set up as a split window. Now, whenever I open dolphin, the right hand window is the “active” one. How does one make the left window the active one by default?
Thanks in advance.

Lenwolf

#2

Hello lenwolf,

I generally use dolphin as a file manager under KDE 4.4.1.

This is set up as a split window. Now, whenever I open dolphin, the right hand window is the “active” one. How does one make the left window the active one by default?
I don’t use dolphin myself.
But I wanted to test this and you’re right it starts with the focus on the right panel.
I searched the configuration files, but couldn’t find any option to change this.

So I think it isn’t possible without changing the source.
Maybe you can do a feature request on the kde forums here.
If you really want this I can take a look at the source code of dolphin.

Good luck!:wink:

#3

Thanks Edward-lii,

at least I know I’m not dreaming.

The link you gave me is unavailable right now, I’ll retry later and make a request.

Thanks.

lenwolf

#4

Compiling it ‘by hand’ would be undone on next kde update…

Tested, confirmed. But here’s my thought on it. Why would you split the window, then have focus on the one you wanted to split off for some reason, doesn’t make sense to me. Would be like new browser tabs all opening in the background.

#5

@Knurpht.

Thanks for your reply.

I want two windows, since this makes copying files to/from one directory to another much more painless, and for various reasons I do a lot of that, though I don’t use dolphin only for that.

So my dolphin is preconfigured always to open with a split window.

I’d like the left pane to have focus, since to the left of to that I have the “speedlink” and that’s what I very often want to hit first - but then i have to traverse all the way to the right because that is the active pane and hence that is where the dir to which one gets through the speedlink in now opened…

Lenwolf.

#6

Hello lenwolf,

Compiling it ‘by hand’ would be undone on next kde update…
That’s right, maybe that isn’t a solution.

I’d like the left pane to have focus, since to the left of to that I have the “speedlink” and that’s what I very often want to hit first - but then i have to traverse all the way to the right because that is the active pane and hence that is where the dir to which one gets through the speedlink in now opened…
I’m afraid you can’t do that with dolphin.
But you can make something equal with konqueror.

  1. Start konqueror.
  2. Settings->Load View Profile. And select File management. You’ll see a bar on the left. There you have a tab called Bookmarks. This is equal to dolphin’s speedlink.
  3. Windows->Split View Left/Right.
  4. Set focus to the left panel.
  5. Settings->Configure View Profiles. Enter a profile name. (For example: Split View File Management).
  6. Deselect “Save URLs in profile” if you want to start with two blank planes. Click on Save to save your profile.

Now you have created a profile that’s hopefully good enough.
You can start it from terminal with this command:

konqueror --profile "Split View File Managment"

Here’s the result.If you want you can create a icon for this command.

If you have any questions feel free to ask.

Good luck!:wink:

#7

@Edward Lii

Thanks for this info.

I would like, however, continue to use dolphin.

Thanks again!

lenwolf