gerenerate desktop folder in Fedora8

[djphan]

Hi FC folks,
I made a mistake with my desktop folder in FC8/Gnome 2.20.3

I have been using root account to rm -rf /home/myaccount/Desktop (not like Ubuntu I can find the removed ones from .Trash-root folder!)

After this incident, I cant find Desktop anywhere and as I come back to desktop and see all my directories laid on this desktop instead of shortcuts of app(s) as b4.

Please help me how to regenerate the desktop, it would be much appreciated

regards
DJ. Phan

[djphan]

I forgot one more thing is after Desktop folder was deleted, my hOme directory functions like a Desktop folder that mean I saw a symbol on home directory represented for Desktop. if possible please clear to me why after Desktop folder got removed,home directory becomes like Desktop?

Thanks
DJ

[PabloTwo]

If you can delete a folder, you can also create a folder. Did you try?, from your home folder:

mkdir Desktop

[djphan]

Yeah I did with no success, I reckon Desktop folder is somehow different from the others. gconf-edit cannot fix this as well. Open $gconf-edit then go to
apps>>nautilus>>references I ve seen an option called [desktop_is_home_dir], now I even check it or uncheck it, my desktop is all dir(s) in my home account!

Thanks for your idea
DJ

[PabloTwo]

When you say "....all dir(s) in my home account!", do you mean all the directories that would normally be in your home directory plus on your Desktop, or all directories that are in the root "/" directory? Did you create the Desktop directory using the name "Desktop" (capital letter D) or "desktop" (lower case d)? It must be upper case "D" to work.

If it's the former, and you have a "Desktop" folder in your home folder, just move all the items that would normally live on your "Desktop" into the Desktop folder from your ~/ folder.

You definatley do not want the "desktop_is_home_dir" item checked off, but do make sure that "show_desktop", in the same configuration pane, is checked off.

When you "rm" files and directories from a command line, they are gone, gone, gone, gone. Items go into .Trash only when deleted from a GUI application. But I guess you have figured that out now.

edit: Also, after makeing some of these changes you may need to restart X. Do that by either logging out, then back in, or do CTRL-ALT-Backspace to force the X session to shut down.

Paul

Probably the simplest thing would be to log-in as root, remove the user with the' Users and Groups' utility, then add him/her back. As Paul said, all the files you had in that directory are gone. You may be able to recreate some of them if you haven't written to the partition in the meantime. Google for 'Recovering files in Linux' but I wouldn't count on it.

Wayne

[PabloTwo]

From the rm command the OP showed in his opening post, the only thing removed would have been the Desktop folder and everything 'on' the Desktop, (me thinks) not the other files and folders in ~/. Creating a new user account was going to be my next suggestion if he couldn't get a normal user desktop configuration restored. Then just copy all the files from his former ~/ directory over to the new one, except 'Desktop', before removing that account.

Paul

Ah, yes, re-reading the OP it seems things are not as bad as I originally thought. If you're right, the OP has learned a valuable lesson methinks!

Wayne

[djphan]

Well thanks a lot for your info and helpPaul and Wayne. I havent unfortunately fixed it up by a simple way as I can.
I reckon one of these folders would be functioning the Desktop:
.gconf .gconfd .gnome2 but I have not yet tracked down its location. If you want to explore it you can create a sample account and remove Desktop to see what s happening.

To Paul: all dir(s) means all dirs r located in djphan such as Documents, Public, Pictures appears on Desktop after removing Desktop folder though I do not check the box [desktop_is_home_dir] in gconf-edit.

My error can be seen as follow by commands:
$nano myprogram.sh and saved @ Desktop
#mv /home/djphan/Desktop /usr/local/bin (This is a MISTAKE step! cuz of not myprogram.sh)
#mv /usr/local/bin/Desktop /home/djphan
at this, Desktop comes back with no Shortcuts but Home, My Computer and permission belongs to root.
# rm -rf /home/djphan/Desktop ( I am quite lazy to chown and chmod for Desktop!!! and think of removing then creating is more simpler.)
Then after that, you both know the story...

If I fix it up by my way, I will be posting it up and share with you all
James

[djphan]

okay I ve got the answer:

go to .config >>>user-dir.dirs open this file and edit first line
XDG_DESKTOP_DIR="$HOME/" to XDG_DESKTOP_DIR="$HOME/Desktop"
I think when I removed Desktop folder then this file was updated by xdg-user-dirs-update cmd
hic! very minor issue costs me time for curiosity
cheers
DJ.

[normfred]

Originally Posted by Wayne

Probably the simplest thing would be to log-in as root, remove the user with the' Users and Groups' utility, then add him/her back. As Paul said, all the files you had in that directory are gone. You may be able to recreate some of them if you haven't written to the partition in the meantime. Google for 'Recovering files in Linux' but I wouldn't count on it.

Wayne

I had the same problem as dj. I solved it using your idea (quoted). I, of course, goofed in the process. I renamed my /home/fred directory to .home/fred1. Then I deleted fred as a user, and ignored a Warning that there were still some processes running under fred. Anyway when I reiset fred as a user, the program went crazy. So I went back to the beginning. I had to turn OFF the computer.

I powered up the computer, logged in as root, created a user norm. logged out as root and in as norm. PERFECT!. Then I copied files from fred1 to norm, deleted fred as user. Everything seems back to normal except the normal setup of programs under a new user.

I have no idea how my home and Desktop directories got merged. But I lost all my files while fooling around trying to figure out what happened. Thankfully I do keep backups.

I strongly advise anyone that develops this problem;
Delete NO files
Do NOT re-install the same user name
If this helps someone, good, it can be partial repayment for the help I have received.
Normfred