How to get language variables (Desktop folder name, Document folder name, etc..)

Question

I am making a script and I am looking for a way to get the variable names for Desktop, Music, Documents, Pictures and others Folders. Depending on the language they change. For example Desktop in Spanish is Escritorio. So how can I get the folder directory without needing to find out what language the user is using or having to make several IF statements for each language.

score 10 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 05 '17 at 17:35

10

There is a tool called xdg-user-dir that retrieves user directories paths

documents_path=$(xdg-user-dir DOCUMENTS)
echo $documents_path

From the docs:

xdg-user-dir looks up the current path for one of the special XDG user dirs.

This command expects the name of an XDG user dir as argument. The possible names are:

DESKTOP

DOWNLOAD

TEMPLATES

PUBLICSHARE

DOCUMENTS

MUSIC

PICTURES

VIDEOS

I'm using Ubuntu 16.04, I don't really know if this is available in previous releases.

answered Apr 05 '17 at 17:35

Arge

116

Thanks for this contribution! This ought to be the accepted answer to the question. – Gunnar Hjalmarsson Apr 05 '17 at 17:45
1

@GunnarHjalmarsson What do you mean. This IS the accepted answer ^^. Excellent work Arge. – Luis Alvarado Apr 05 '17 at 17:54
1

Great that you changed it, @LuisAlvarado. – Gunnar Hjalmarsson Apr 05 '17 at 18:11

score 4 · Answer 2 · edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:23

4

The common folder names are as follows. Just extracted from a file in home directory.

XDG_DESKTOP_DIR="$HOME/Desktop"
XDG_DOWNLOAD_DIR="$HOME/Downloads"
XDG_TEMPLATES_DIR="$HOME/Templates"
XDG_PUBLICSHARE_DIR="$HOME/Public"
XDG_DOCUMENTS_DIR="$HOME/Documents"
XDG_MUSIC_DIR="$HOME/Music"
XDG_PICTURES_DIR="$HOME/"
XDG_VIDEOS_DIR="$HOME/Videos"

Of course, you are only interested in the variable name. So there are XDG_DESKTOP_DIR, XDG_DOWNLOAD_DIR, .... etc.

Related question: How can I change the default location of content directories (eg Pictures, Templates, Music) in my home folder?

Hope this will help.

edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:23

Community

1

answered Sep 28 '12 at 17:37

Anwar

76,649

Wow!. Thanks Anwar. Nice list. I got a little problem testing it. Doing echo on any of the variables throws nothing. I found the information in ~/.config//user-dirs.dirs but still the variables are empty. – Luis Alvarado Sep 28 '12 at 18:10
same here, i also don't see those variables in terminal (at least not by default). localized folder names drive me absolutely crazy. – kritzikratzi Oct 09 '12 at 18:14
@LuisAlvarado @ritzikratzi the default method to change these variables in change in ~/.config/user-dirs.dirs file. and I think these variables aren't available from terminal – Anwar Oct 10 '12 at 02:56

score 0 · Answer 3 · edited Dec 01 '13 at 13:30

0

Perhaps there's an easier way to do it, but this is what i've done:

For example, getting desktop folder:

desktopVar=$(cat $HOME/.config/user-dirs.dirs | grep "XDG_DESKTOP_DIR")
desktopFolder=$(echo ${desktopVar/XDG_DESKTOP_DIR=/""} | tr -d '"')
echo $desktopFolder

For other variables is analogous.

edited Dec 01 '13 at 13:30

Braiam

67,791
32
179
269

answered Dec 01 '13 at 12:17

rasecfight

1

How to get language variables (Desktop folder name, Document folder name, etc..)

3 Answers3