[Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

DeerDance · 2015-08-02 00:04:46

Nemo, Nautilus and Dolphin all support this.

I see no reason why when I am giving command to thunar to open path it should go look for default applications and launch them with that path.
If I would want that I would use xdg-open, but maybe thunar serves as some alternative to it.
Anyway it would be great if there would be something like dolphin has --select attribute, so that the file/directory of interest is highlighted right away which in many situations can be very helpful

thank you

ToZ · 2015-08-02 11:13:50

Hello and welcome.

DeerDance wrote:

I see no reason why when I am giving command to thunar to open path it should go look for default applications and launch them with that path.

What command are you using?
Running "thunar /path" (where /path is a valid path on your system) will open thunar at that location.

Anyway it would be great if there would be something like dolphin has --select attribute, so that the file/directory of interest is highlighted right away which in many situations can be very helpful

For those of us that don't/haven't used dolphin, can you better explain exactly how this works?

It might also be helpful if you stated which distro and which version of Xfce you are using?

DeerDance · 2015-08-02 18:20:34

OK, so here it goes with gifs as well

If you give path that ends with a file to Nemo or Nautilus, it will open the directory containing that file and the file itself would be highlighted/selected.
What would Thunar do here is not open itself to show that file, it would run that file.
This feature works only on files, since this is default behavior and if the last item in the path is a directory it would just be opened.

heres example of this opening /usr/share/applications/firefox.desktop

Dolphin behaves differently, at default its the same as Thunar, if its a file it opens it with the default application I assume based on its mime type, if its a directory it just opens it.
But Dolphin has option to use --select
Which in both files and directories opens the directory containing the last item in the path and selects that item

heres an example, sorry for the poor quality

So it would be nice that Thunar would too have this --select option IMO

Last edited by DeerDance (2015-08-02 18:24:40)

ToZ · 2015-08-02 19:32:52

Thunar has GTK type-ahead functionality. Open thunar with the directory containing the file you are interested in:

thunar /usr/share/applications

...then start typing out "firefox.desktop". It will highlight the file as soon as there is a complete match (on my system, after the 3rd character).

DeerDance · 2015-08-02 19:48:09

I know
its more for other applications that would like to open for user some file locations that would make use of this.

ToZ · 2015-08-02 20:18:33

Although the Thunar developer does visit these forums regularly, the best place to put this feature request is in the bug tracker.

nemoinis · 2015-09-21 07:55:28

I wrote a script a while ago that does that (highlight a specified file in Thunar), to serve as the picasa-hook-filemanager.sh
It requires "xdotool" to be installed.

#!/bin/sh
#---------< Hook File >------------------------------------------------------
#
#       Picasa 'Hook' file to allow Picasa to be more closely
#   integrated with your desktop.
#
#   Picasa tries to integrate nicely with the Linux desktop where
#   and when it can.  However, Linux does not have standard or
#   well defined interfaces for many functions.
#
#   These hook files are provided by Google to allow users to
#   fine tune their integration of Picasa with their particular
#   Linux desktop environment.
#
#---------< hook-filemanager >------------------------------------------------
#
#   picasa-hook-filemanager.sh
#
#   This script is passed a command line with a single file name
#
#   The ideal behavior is for the file manager to open the directory
#   that contains that file, with that file highlighted.
#
#   If this script exits with a status of 0, then Picasa will
#   assume that you have handled the request, and will not perform
#   any further processing.
#
#   To use this file:
#       copy the picasa-hook-filemanager.sh.template file to
#       some place in your path, and name it picasa-hook-filemanager.sh.
#       Then edit the script to add the functionality you need
#
#----------------------------------------------------------------------------

mydir="$1"
[ ! -d "$mydir" ] && mydir=$(dirname "$mydir")

thunar "$mydir"

#now try to highlight the file. This requires xdotool installed
thefile=$(basename "$1")
if [ -n "$thefile" ] && [ -e /usr/bin/xdotool ] ; then
    sleep 0.5 #time for thunar to initialize
    xdotool - <<EOF
key ctrl+f
type "$thefile"
EOF
xdotool key Escape
fi

exit 0

Last edited by nemoinis (2015-09-21 07:55:55)

DeerDance · 2015-10-23 10:53:24

@nemoinis nice idea, didnt thought about fixing it through bash script, theres & missing after launching thunar, or it will not continue, but works decently. THANKS.

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#1 2015-08-02 00:04:46

[Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

#2 2015-08-02 11:13:50

Re: [Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

#3 2015-08-02 18:20:34

Re: [Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

#4 2015-08-02 19:32:52

Re: [Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

#5 2015-08-02 19:48:09

Re: [Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

#6 2015-08-02 20:18:33

Re: [Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

#7 2015-09-21 07:55:28

Re: [Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

#8 2015-10-23 10:53:24

Re: [Feature Request] Thunar, open path with last item selected/highlight

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