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I want to be able to "open in terminal" from any directory.

I have the nautilus-open-terminal package installed

I'm not sure what the problem is exactly: when there's only a couple of items in a directory I can just right-click in the empty space, see the context menu, and click "Open in Terminal".

But if there's enough items to create a scroll bar there's nowhere to right click for the current directory.

If I right click on the breadcrumbs I don't see "open in terminal". The same happens when I look at the "File" menu.

This means that if there's a scrollbar there's no way to open a terminal in the current directory - I need to go up a directory, find the directory I was just in, and right click on that to open a terminal.

If there's no way around this it would be just as good to have a key combo to open a terminal in the current directory (ctrl-alt-t opens a terminal in my home directory).

Thanks for your help!

edit: I'm using list view

david_nash
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  • did my answer solved your problem? if yes please accept, if not please let me know the problem – Alex Jones Jun 29 '18 at 09:50
  • @edwardtorvalds it's not very convenient, and the 'menu' key in your image doesn't work for me - I have to use shift-f10. Swapping from mouse to keyboard and back to mouse isn't efficient. In Nautilus 3.26 there's an 'icon view' icon in the menu bar, so I toggle using that, right click in an empty space, then switch back to list view when I'm done. – david_nash Jul 08 '18 at 22:32

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Go to the directory where you want to open in terminal. Make sure your cursor in inside in window (where files are displayed). If a file is selected, press the Ctrl + Space to deselect it. Then press Option key.

Keyboard with the option key highlighted

Then context menu pops up. Now you can select the open in terminal option.

Calimo
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Alex Jones
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  • He's probably using list view where it's hard not to have a file selected when the view is full – doug Nov 17 '14 at 00:49
  • definitely, but whatever it may be using Option key works – Alex Jones Nov 17 '14 at 00:51
  • I like this! Although once I select a file I can't unselect it and it doesn't work - I get the context menu for the selected file/directory (and yes, using list view) – david_nash Nov 18 '14 at 04:07
  • @david_nash there is no way around this! if you have selected the file, you have to go one directory up then come down again. then press Option Key. or we could do is give feedback to canonical ! – Alex Jones Nov 18 '14 at 04:51
  • @edwardtorvalds okay thanks, it's good to know it's not just my system. – david_nash Nov 18 '14 at 21:43
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    @david_nash i reported to canonical. we cant do any thing in this matter. better using icon view – Alex Jones Nov 19 '14 at 03:02
  • @edwardtorvalds okay, thanks - you rock! Though I don't like icon view, I find it faster to just scan my eyes down the window (plus I'm used to it) – david_nash Nov 19 '14 at 07:46
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    I don't have that keyboard key. – Laurent Feb 09 '16 at 04:42
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    @Laurent Me too. Just use Shift+F10 instead. – user502144 Aug 01 '17 at 13:10
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    If a file is already selected try to use Ctrl+Space. I don't know if it is a universal solution, but it works for me in Ubuntu 17.04. – user502144 Aug 01 '17 at 13:39
  • @user502144 you rock! – Vanni Totaro Sep 07 '17 at 07:32
  • While this works well in 16.04 too, it needs 5 keystrokes to open the terminal :-/. Not very efficient. – pLumo Jun 29 '18 at 11:21
  • @user502144, Shit+F10 and Ctrl-Space are fine but in Nautilus (at least 3.28.1-stable) you can press Ctrl+F10 and even if there is a file selected it will open the context menu for the directory (even in list view). – alfC Aug 28 '18 at 02:02
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I know, this is not a real answer to the question.
But it is an alternative to achieve what OP requests as Nautilus does not natively offer a solution:

Use Nemo.

There you can add a button in the Toolbar to open Terminal in current folder.

enter image description here

More on Nemo:

pLumo
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The issue boils down to not having empty space where you can right-click with your mouse without touching a file or directory, so, you have to make some space, an easy way is to change the view from list to grid, in the grid view you have plenty of empty space just for you :) On the following page, you see an image, on the left side you have the grid view, on the right side, you have the list view. To toggle between them you have a button on the top right corner (it also appears in both pictures of the link above).

Melardev
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  • You've correctly identified the issue but I'm not toggling views back and forth every time I want to open a terminal. I use Nemo now. It has a small terminal icon always visible, and works well for me. – david_nash Mar 26 '20 at 20:55