I’ve got this really strange problem that I’m really hoping someone can help me with, as it’s extremely counter-productive.
I’ve got openSUSE 11.1 (x86_64) and KDE 4.2.3. Every time I go to open a directory in KDE, it opens it in Gwenview instead of Dolphin. It worked fine before I upgraded from 4.1.3.
So I went into KDE4’s component chooser and sure enough, Gwenview was listed as the default file manager. So I changed the setting to Dolphin and clicked Apply.
I got the “Updating System Configuration” box. It passes to 100% several times and then tries to make one more round, in which case it comes to a crawl. I’ve let it sit for hours and it never “finishes” the that system config update.
I tried editing the filetype “inode/directory” and making Dolphin the first preference app, but when I click Apply I get that same stupid “updating system configuration” box.
Open Dolphin, right click any folder in /home
Select properties
Click the Spanner Icon in the box
You should have a list of preferred applications
Delete gwenview
apply
What happens?
Also check in the Configure Desktop - Default Applications - File Manager
what is listed there
I deleted Gwenview, clicked apply and it does the same thing… “updating system configuration”. It does it several times, getting slower and slower with each iteration.
Seems to me that maybe it’s picking up Gwenview because it’s the first one in the preferences list. I don’t know.
The default applications list is where I went initially to change the setting from Gwenview.
List as follows:
Gwenview
Konqueror
File Manager - Super User Mode
KDirStat/KDE3
Konqueror/KDE3
Dolphin
Open Folder
Cervisa/KDE3
Other: click Add… in the dialog shown here: ((button with ellipsis)
Doesn’t seem to matter what I change… it’s refusing to write the configuration. Looks like a potential bug. I’m going to try with a fresh KDE profile and see if that makes a difference (backup old one first, of course).
I toyed around a bit with it and couldn’t fix it. So I ended up recreating my entire KDE profile.
A pain, yes. But I can say that it takes far less tweaking on my part to get KDE4 where I want versus KDE3 (kudos to the KDE developers).
But that did fix it. I also noticed a significant speed increase and a far cleaner desktop experience (visually things are smoother as well).
I’m not sure if that is because of differences between 4.1 and 4.2, or if it’s the way the openSUSE rpms are built/packaged. In any event, it works and I’m very happy with it.
I do wish I could have found out what was causing the problem though…
In the past I had rather odd happenings in the .kde4 profile but I mean back as recently as Nov 08’. So not recent really. And I too found a new .kde4 the simplest solution. But since then all is well.
Until this problem occurred, I wasn’t aware there was a default file manager component. That’s an awesome feature, really. I could see it being useful, especially for those who prefer Konqueror over Dolphin.
On a side note, I have to admit, I wasn’t all that warm to the idea of Dolphin when KDE4 was in the planning stages. But I have really grown to like it. While I still think Konqueror is really awesome, I have come to prefer Dolphin for file management.
I guess it just goes to show you that many of us out there that questioned the KDE developer’s directions didn’t see their vision. I think KDE4 is really coming along nicely, and I’m excited to see 4.3.