[Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

sonichy · 2024-03-03 16:10:03

It may cause privacy leaks.

ToZ · 2024-03-03 19:25:16

Out of curiosity, how would it case "privacy leaks"? Its basically a method for tracking opened files within the context of a user environment. It doesn't leak information out like other tracking services might.

Regardless, the file that stores the information is located at ~/local/share/recently-used.xbel. With GTK apps, you can disable the tracking of recently used files by adding:

[Settings]
gtk-recent-files-enabled=0

...to ~/.config/gtk-3.0/settings.ini. Note: this will only impact GTK apps.

Also, with thunar, you can right-click on "Places", select "Places" and uncheck "Recent" to hide the display of that entry.

sonichy · 2024-03-04 08:49:25

Thunar, right-click on "Places", "Places" uncheck "Recent" is good for me.

kreemoweet · 2024-03-13 06:22:42

Unchecking "Recent" in Thunar does not stop the logging of opened files by Thunar (and others), it is just
not displayed in Thunar's side panel. However, assigning the "immutable" attribute to the recently-used.xbel
file will stop it cold. Thunar will then complain endlessly in the x-session-errors file about not being able to
write or change permissions on recently-used.xbel.

conserned_user · 2024-11-12 11:33:37

Hi,
Can you please add a way to disable this completely with graphical user interface.
For my purposes we have no need this. Many users use the same account and we do no appreciate this tracking feature. Hiding it is not a good solution if turning it back on shows that it was still tracking everything the whole time. It would also be great if only super users can enable or disable it.

I did make recently-used.xbel read only but doing that cause some stability issues we had to turn it back on. I'm back where again because we need and want this to be disabled.

I will be checking will be checking this thread frequently for updates but for now I will be looking for alternatives that do not have this flaw, any suggestion will be appreciated. Thunar is actually one of the reasons we chose to use Mint XFCE, we originally didn't like how the one in Linux mint cinnamon worked and the Thunar was the closest to windows explorer and it had least resistance to people we were trying to convince and get them to use linux.

on2wi · 2024-12-26 10:58:36

Hi,

1: If you delete a file in "recents" the list is not refreshed, so the files remain visible but are deleted in the background.
If you try again, you will of course get an error message.

2. For safety, there should be a "Clear List" function without deleting the files.

ToZ · 2024-12-26 12:35:59

@conserned_user, see: https://gitlab.xfce.org/xfce/thunar/-/issues/1355.

@on2wi, you should create a bug report: https://gitlab.xfce.org/xfce/thunar/-/issues.

jj_son · 2025-04-06 03:10:21

sonichy wrote:

Thunar, right-click on "Places", "Places" uncheck "Recent" is good for me.

This method doesn't work. This method only works in shortcut view. If I make this change in shortcut view then go back to tree view, the folder is still there. As far as I can tell, there's no way to edit the tree view.

Found a possible workaround here: https://forum.mxlinux.org/viewtopic.php?t=78037

JmaCWQ · 2025-04-06 06:42:12

I disabled it a while ago by deleting the file ~/.local/share/recently-used.xbel, then created an empty folder in ~/.local/share named recently-used.xbel

I'm not sure if that's good or bad and I can't even remember now where I found the info but it works for me on MX-21.
It will however leave messages in ~.xsession-errors like this:

(geany:4325): Gtk-WARNING **: 16:31:05.242: Attempting to store changes into '/home/home/.local/share/recently-used.xbel', but failed: Failed to rename file “/home/home/.local/share/recently-used.xbel.8IHJ42” to “/home/home/.local/share/recently-used.xbel”: g_rename() failed: Is a directory

Apart from the log entries I have seen no issues with it.
Apps that when opening a file default to the 'Recent' list still do so, but the list is now always empty.

SMXuser · 2025-04-17 07:16:04

Hi all. I agree 100% with the need for being able to either completely remove the recents folder view in Thunar, or at the very least to be able to disable it while also causing for recents to no longer appear in the the tree view of the open Thunar file manager.
I'm actually surprised that this was not thought about right from the inception of planning for recents to appear. Obviously most people who use Thunar as a primary tool every day with dozens upon dozens of available folders would have little use for the recents list. As already hinted at above, it's also annoying that it takes up the space of another bookmark for people who prefer to not use Thunar in full screen mode.

https://gitlab.xfce.org/xfce/thunar/-/issues/1355

Clearly that function was not well thought out. sad

For me, this worked and that's how I'll keep it:
1. Somewhere in a blank space, left side of Thunar, right-click, choose places, and uncheck recents.
2. Using this command clear the list (no sudo required):

rm ~/.local/share/recently-used.xbel

3. Don't know this for certain, but perhaps a repeat of 1 & 2 may be needed after future Thunar updates.

.

Last edited by SMXuser (2025-04-17 07:25:57)

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#1 2024-03-03 16:10:03

[Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#2 2024-03-03 19:25:16

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#3 2024-03-04 08:49:25

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#4 2024-03-13 06:22:42

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#5 2024-11-12 11:33:37

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#6 2024-12-26 10:58:36

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#7 2024-12-26 12:35:59

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#8 2025-04-06 03:10:21

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#9 2025-04-06 06:42:12

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

#10 2025-04-17 07:16:04

Re: [Thunar] How to disable recent visited ?

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