A basic desktop, the simple way

Theres been a couple of posts on this already, but most do more than I want, or I run into trouble when trying them.

Linpus Lite is cute, but its not as easy as it should be to change the basic interface.

I find I can get most of what I want simply from the Xfce Desktop Preferences window: I can change the desktop image to someting else (persistent if I copy the image over to usr/share/xfce4/backdrops directory. I can remove the Acer start up icons by selecting from the Behavior tap of the same window, at the bottom where it says Desktop Icons, set to none.

So I have a pretty wallpaper, and no launcher windows/icons. But... I still have te Acer search bar floating two thirds up the screen, and also no way of shortcuts, or icons, or whateve you like to call them, on my nice new clean desktop.

You'd think I'd be able to do that from the built in configuration windows, ranther than having to dive off to the terminal and edit configuration files. That's the equivalent in Windows-speak of editing the registry just to put a shortcut to explorer on the desktop!

And from what I've seen of Linux, these kind of edits tend to have unintended and unpleasant consequences.

So, staying away from the terminal as much as possible, how can I get rid of the search bar and put my own icons on the desktop, keeping under the Xfce environment?

 

Hi,

at least you can get rid of the search bar via the package manager.
Just search for "acer-search" and you'll find it.

I personally dont know an other way to get your own Icons in the acer xfce desktop than editing the
/home/user/.config/xfce4/desktop/group-app.xml.
Therefore you need a terminal to do

Code:

sudo mousepad /home/user/.config/xfce4/desktop/group-app.xml

It isnt thaaaat difficult to get your favourite apps on the file, internet, fun or files tab. You just have to know where your app has been installed. Usually it is /usr/share/applications.

I hope this can be useful for you

greets
suki22

 

That sounds relatively straightforward, I'll give it a try.

Thanks!

 

How were you able to alter the backdrops folder? It won't allow me to as it is protected to "root" and i'm apparently logged in as "user"?...I'm confused here.

 

You'll either have to modify the permissions to that folder or do your copy as root. Have a bit of a google around for the 'su' and 'sudo' commands which will allow you to become root and execute commands as root, respectively.

 

Yeah, what realised later was that you cant put icons on the desktop in xfce in the normal way. This feature was first enabled in the laest version 4.4, and I dont think the One has that. The group-app script is for the default four-quandrant launcher.

So its relatively easy to edit the laucher icons, deleting or adding new ones. It is probably possible to edit the appearance of the launcher, remove groups, change colors, maybe even do some fancy stuff ... but this is beyond me, especially since one mistake here will likely bork your desktop completely. It does not seem possible to replace the launcher with icons directly on the desktop however. Not without getting out of xfce intirely, at which point you lose all the Aer customizations.

At least thats what it seems like. I'm going to roll over and play nice with Acer, leaving my one as close to factory as possible and wait to be able to add apps from the acerone web site....

/R