GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 784115
gvfs drag and drop from fuse mount broken
Last modified: 2018-09-21 18:06:50 UTC
Cannot drag and drop any gvfs mounted files from nautilus to anything else. Example. SMB mounted folder in nautilus window with jpgs. Gmail in Firefox. If I drag a file from Nautilus to Firefox, I get the overlay in gmail that 'looks like' it is getting a file dropped, but when I release the mouse button, nothing happens. same with sftp mounted folders. Searching on this, it seems that it is a common problem with native linux apps in gnome and the work arounds all deal with older versions of gnome vfs or older gvfs. To make it work, I have to create a sym link to the /run/blah blah in my home directory and can use the file append function in gmail (paperclip icon). This is a pain and must be re-done each time. Also gvfs does not 'play well' with wine apps. This may be a similar problem or a fix could fix this as well. I have not been able to get wine apps to work with gvfs mounted files in a long time. I used to be able to make a sym link to the .gvfs folder in my home dir, but now that it is in /run *and* has colons and spaces in the name, it is useless to wine. i.e. I am running excel in wine and have an smb mounted server folder with my xlxs files in it. Have to copy the file over to my local files system, edit it, then copy it back in nautilus. I know there were changes to gvfs to make it work better in gnome, but it has hampered the usability, IMO. For me, Linux must be a swiss army knife. It must be able to mount and read all kinds of file systems and run 32 bit, 64 bit and windows programs and it does all that, but it seems there is a limitation on file access from the running programs by gvfs. I do not know how much of this interoperability problem is gvfs and how much is nautilus, but it is here anyway.
Which exact gvfs version is this about? Which distribution?
It does this with Arch using gvfs 1.32.1-1 and Nautilus 3.24.1 as well as with Ubuntu 16.04.1 using Gnome 3.18-5 (gvfs 1.28.2-1ubuntu1~16.04.1 and Nautilus 3.14.3). If I make a symlink to the folder in my local directory, (ln -s /run/user/1003/gvfs/smb_blah_blah_blah stuff) I can drag and drop that file from ~/stuff to firefox. This feels to me as an unintended behavior. As a user, if I can mount the directory (smb, sftp, etc) and 'see' the files in the nautilus window, I feel I should be able to drag and drop them onto another program window and if that program knows what to do with the drop, all should be 'good'. Is there some setting somewhere in Gnome that needs to be changed to allow this?
Is there an explanation of my failure to set something or can I offer more assistance?
This is still a problem. Can I offer any assistance?
FUrther information. These are a couple of interactions I have noted. I posted 1 as a separate bug, but think it belongs here 1) Mount a share in nautilus (connect to server) Open Github Desktop and mount the remote directory in nautilus using sftp now tell github desktop to use that directory and pull error! Does not work with any protocol, smb or sftp. Still working on this and will try a cli mount command, but this is just crazy that this does not work and has been broken for so long. It works beautifully in windows, surf to a directory and as long as it is visible in the file manager, you can mount it and do everything you want. Allows you to develop on a headless machine remotely using a computer with a GUI. Previously, you could force gvfs to work by going to the ~/.gvfs directory and clicking on files. Now that the link is in the root fs and convoluted with = and :, many things are broken and do not appear to be on the radar to be fixed. 2) Open firefox and drag and drop a file from a remote directory into an email compose window All you get it the text of the link: "sftp://alarm@192.168.2.199/home/alarm/script.sh" It doesn't mattery which protocol you are using to mount the networked file system. You can click on the paper clip (insert the file) then navigate to it, you just cannot drag and drop. It is easier to navigate to a picture you are trying to attach? Now, which was it img_0221.jpg or img_0222.jpg... THis also breaks wine interactions but I know it is heresy to use a windows program on linux...
-- GitLab Migration Automatic Message -- This bug has been migrated to GNOME's GitLab instance and has been closed from further activity. You can subscribe and participate further through the new bug through this link to our GitLab instance: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gvfs/issues/300.