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flymike
Asked: 2017-05-09 05:25:06 +0800 CST

Files App Download Bookmark

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Files app in Ubuntu 16.04 has a Download bookmark with a download icon beside it. The bookmark points to $HOME/Downloads.

I wanted to change where it pointed to, but discovered that it's not a bookmark listed under the Menu item, Bookmarks. Instead, it seems to be one of the "special" bookmarks, like Recent, and Desktop.

How can I change where the Downloads "bookmark" points to?

files

2 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    I'm sure there is a proper, clean way to do this by changing the default location of the Downloads directory. The proper, clean way to do this is given by Mook765 below. I suggest you use that.

    A simple approach would be to just make $HOME/Downloads into a symlink pointing to wherever you want to keep it. For example, if you want it to point to $HOME/foo, you could do:

    mv ~/Downloads ~/foo  ## rename the existing dir
ln -s ~/foo ~/Downloads ## create the link

    Now, when you click on the Downloads bookmark, it will actually be going to $HOME/foo.

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  2. You can define the default user-directories in the file /home/<username>/.config/user-dirs.dirs.

    # This file is written by xdg-user-dirs-update
# If you want to change or add directories, just edit the line you're
# interested in. All local changes will be retained on the next run
# Format is XDG_xxx_DIR="$HOME/yyy", where yyy is a shell-escaped
# homedir-relative path, or XDG_xxx_DIR="/yyy", where /yyy is an
# absolute path. No other format is supported.
# 
XDG_DESKTOP_DIR="$HOME/Desktop"
XDG_DOWNLOAD_DIR="$HOME/Downloads"
XDG_TEMPLATES_DIR="$HOME/Templates"
XDG_PUBLICSHARE_DIR="$HOME/Public"
XDG_DOCUMENTS_DIR="$HOME/Documents"
XDG_MUSIC_DIR="$HOME/Music"
XDG_PICTURES_DIR="$HOME/Pictures"
XDG_VIDEOS_DIR="$HOME/Videos"

    Just browse to the file in your file manager, open it with a double-click, and change the line you are interested in. Save the file. The changes will take effect after your next login.

    Make sure that the destination-folder you specify exists!

    You can also use the terminal-command 

    xdg-user-dirs-update --set DOWNLOAD $HOME/yyy   or
xdg-user-dirs-update --set DOWNLOAD /yyy

    to achieve this.

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