GNOME session save and restore

Save and restore your GNOME Shell desktop active running application windows and their positions across multiple workspaces using an automated command line script. Synopsis:

To save your session, press Alt+F2 or on a terminal:

>session save

To restore your session, press Alt+F2 or on a terminal:

>session restore

To restore your . . . → Read More: GNOME session save and restore

Thunderbird: Highlight row on focus

I use the keyboard a lot. For many years now, Thunderbird’s default theme (probably inherited from the desktop, which does the same thing on many dialogues) has had a little quirk that is slightly less conducive to keyboard use: It does not highlight the row with focus. Here is an example:

This way, I . . . → Read More: Thunderbird: Highlight row on focus

GNOME session save and restore

A newer version of this script is now available.

This script is used to save and restore a desktop session.

Why this script?

Some desktop managers do offer some session management features. Under GNOME it may be possible to run gnome-session-properties manually and turn on “Automatically remember running applications when logging out”. However, some GNOME . . . → Read More: GNOME session save and restore

Prevent GNOME screensaver during full-screen Flash videos

While movie players (such as VLC) prevent the GNOME screensaver from activating during movie playback, playing Flash videos does not affect the screensaver, which means having to move the mouse occasionally, or turning off the screensaver while watching YouTube videos and the like.

There is no perfect solution to this, but using a script, it . . . → Read More: Prevent GNOME screensaver during full-screen Flash videos

Dual-monitor + TV

In the current GNOME shell, Xinerama, the feature that supports more than 2 adjacent displays, is broken. With my nVidia card, the native Nouveau driver doesn’t even detect the 3rd output. The proprietary nVidia driver detects 3 outputs, but cannot enable all of them simultaneously, even without Xinerama (ie, as separate X displays). 🙁 So . . . → Read More: Dual-monitor + TV

Nautilus open-with / mime-type associations

Using the native GNOME file manager Nautilus, you can double-click on a file to open it with its default application. If you don’t like that, are not sure what the default application is, or want to modify it, then you can right-click on the file to see a list of mime-type associations. The first item . . . → Read More: Nautilus open-with / mime-type associations

Customizing the GNOME Shell menu

The GNOME Shell (GNOME 3) menu, is customized using the alacarte application. Install this application if you wish to edit the menu. If you want to know more about how the menu works in order to write a script to manage it, or do things that alacarte can’t do, then read on.

The freedesktop standard:

. . . → Read More: Customizing the GNOME Shell menu