How do I set the default terminal in GNOME?

Question

I want to change the default terminal in the GNOME desktop environment to lilyterm. Here are the instructions that I've found on the internet:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.default-applications.terminal exec lilyterm
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.default-applications.terminal exec-arg ""

But when I'm pressing the shortcut that should run the default terminal, I'm getting:

Windows manager warning: Error on terminal command"(null)". Terminal command is not defined.

Where have I made a mistake?

score 12 · Answer 1 · edited Feb 18 '22 at 17:46

12

Have you tried changing it via the Terminal command:

sudo update-alternatives --config x-terminal-emulator

I guess this does not help if the GNOME shortcut is set specifically to gnome-terminal instead of x-terminal-emulator.

edited Feb 18 '22 at 17:46

BeastOfCaerbannog

14,585

answered Apr 21 '12 at 23:26

marto

1,391

Doron Behar · Answer 2 · 2023-05-01T19:24:28.280

10

Most of the answers here are outdated for today's Gnome software. For Gnome 3.36 there's no easy workaround. The problem lies in the fact that most Gnome software is based on Gio which it decides what terminal emulator to use eventually. Quoting a Gnome developer from gitlab.gnome.org:

The decision which terminal is going to be used by gnome-shell when starting apps that specify that they run in a terminal is made by glib and not gnome-shell and currently in glib there is a hardcoded list of terminals that is being tried).

Hence, looking e.g at Gio's (version 2.76.2) code responsible for this behavior, we can see that Gio has hard coded the tests for several specific terminal emulators' executables search in $PATH. xdg-terminal-exec is tested there first and other terminal emulators are tested further. If xdg-terminal-exec is found in your $PATH, it will be used and there's nothing one can do, besides altering the programs in your $PATH:

# ln -s /usr/bin/lilyterm /usr/bin/xdg-terminal-exec

This also means that the most widely solution to this problem, using gsettings, doesn't work (also proposed here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5).

edited May 01 '23 at 19:24

answered Jul 29 '20 at 10:54

Doron Behar

265

As of gnome 3.36.8 (Ubuntu 20.04.8) this solution doesnt work either. Nautilus keeps opening gnome-terminal. I tried update-alternatives + creating a symlink to the terminal I want to launch when right-clicking -> Open In Terminal. update-alternatives only changes the behavior of Ctrl-Alt-T. That really sucks. – Daniel Bişar Feb 16 '22 at 06:40
Here on NixOS, with gnome 41.2, and nautilus 41.1, I don't even see anymore the "open terminal" button. – Doron Behar Feb 18 '22 at 11:12
2

@DanielBişar, @DoronBehar For Nautilus, you will have to uninstall nautilus-extension-gnome-terminal plugin, and then instead install the nautilus-open-any-terminal plugin. – A S May 26 '22 at 03:41
1

@DoronBehar apparently, there has been some development in this area, and (per your link to the bugzilla) GNOME will support the xdg-terminal-exec utility going forward. May be interesting to revise your answer in a couple of months, if xdg-terminal-exec should become part of the freedesktop standard. +1 for the comprehensive (and most up to date) answer though – Fynn Apr 30 '23 at 11:54
Thanks for noticing @Fynn. I update the links and I updated the ln command to use xdg-terminal-exec. – Doron Behar May 01 '23 at 19:25

score 2 · Answer 3 · edited Feb 18 '22 at 17:52

2

There are a few options:

Try with:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.default-applications.terminal exec 'lilyterm'
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.default-applications.terminal exec-arg '-x'

Note: You need to log out and log in again (tested succesfully on GNOME on Ubuntu 13.04).

Another possibility is to go to Shortcuts in GNOME Settings and add a new one with lilyterm as command, and set it to Ctrl+Alt+T or anything else you prefer.
Another way is to replace gnome-terminal with a symlink that points to lilyterm - but you don't want to do that.

edited Feb 18 '22 at 17:52

BeastOfCaerbannog

14,585

answered Mar 09 '12 at 21:07

dadexix86

6,616

1

Still equal error message. – Nelson Tatius Mar 09 '12 at 21:10
I modified the answer, please check this. – dadexix86 Mar 09 '12 at 21:17
1

Nothing changes :(. In my opinion, such error message indicates, that desktop.default-applications.terminal and Default Terminal in shortcut settings is different things. – Nelson Tatius Mar 09 '12 at 21:34
Have tou tried to logout-login after changing the settings? I think that gconf should be updated with this new gsettings configurations. – dadexix86 Mar 09 '12 at 23:00
@dadexix86less yes, I have. – Nelson Tatius Mar 09 '12 at 23:14
That's interesting. As said here: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GNOME#Default_terminal it seems that these settings are just for nautilus-open-terminal (can you check that there it works?) I added a couple of possible workarounds to the answer. – dadexix86 Mar 10 '12 at 00:26

score 1 · Answer 4 · edited Feb 18 '22 at 17:49

1

I just accidentally bumped into this question and this what worked for me:

Check which terminal is left in your system. I had already removed all "terminal apps" such as xterm etc and chose rxvt-unicode as default terminal.
Then go to Settings → Keyboard Shortcuts and create a custom shortcut. It will do the trick for you.

edited Feb 18 '22 at 17:49

BeastOfCaerbannog

14,585

answered Jun 21 '12 at 10:50

user72258

11

A. Hayes · Answer 5 · 2012-04-23T01:40:39.840

0

Perhaps you should open the add/edit users dialogue and see if you can change the default terminal there.

Updated: Users & Groups (as admin) > Select User > Advanced Settings > Advanced > Shell

There is a drop down menu, but you can also type out /path/to/your/shell.

edited Apr 23 '12 at 01:40

answered Apr 22 '12 at 01:27

A. Hayes

63
3

1

This is talking about terminal emulators, not shells. – Ryan C. Thompson May 04 '12 at 00:39

How do I set the default terminal in GNOME?

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