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I just did a fresh install of Ubuntu 13.10 (actually, I've done two fresh installs, hoping that trying again would get this working).

I don't seem to have the ability to add or remove bookmarks from Nautilus. The ones that are there by default (Home, Desktop, Documents, etc.) work fine. I can right click on them and rename them. However, I cannot remove any of them. The option is there "Remove" but disabled/grayed out.

The same is true if I try to add bookmarks. I go to "Files -> Bookmarks", and all the bookmarks show up, but the buttons at the bottom to add, remove, or re-order the bookmarks are simply disabled.

What am I doing wrong?

Isaac Dontje Lindell
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3 Answers3

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Custom bookmarks

To add and remove custom bookmarks, refer to the documentation in Files ▸ Help ▸ Edit folder bookmarks:

Add a bookmark:

  1. Open the folder (or location) that you want to bookmark.

  2. Click the gear button in the toolbar and pick Bookmark this Location.

Delete a bookmark:

  1. Click on Files in the top bar and pick Bookmarks from the app menu.

  2. In the Bookmarks window, select the bookmark you wish to delete and click the - button.

The "gear button" is on the right side of Nautilus:

Bookmark this location - Nautilus - Ubuntu 13.10

It will be grayed out if the location you've opened is already bookmarked.

Places

The bookmarks seen under the "Places" heading are an exception:

Remove grayed out - Places - Nautilus - Ubuntu 13.10

They're not just bookmarks, but XDG user directories with a separate configuration backend, so the Nautilus developers deliberately chose to disable removing them.

The issue of working around this limitation is being discussed in this question.

Community
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ændrük
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  • I know that, but the bookmark system has issues. I have always used "Ctrl+D" to make bookmarks. Even using the actual button fails. – Devyn Collier Johnson Oct 21 '13 at 21:03
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    This doesn't work - that option is also greyed out. Also doesn't help with being upble to remove existing bookmarks. – Isaac Dontje Lindell Oct 21 '13 at 21:12
  • @IsaacDontjeLindell I've copied and pasted the documentation for removing bookmarks for you. When trying to add a bookmark, what folder did you open in step one? If it's already in the bookmarks (see Files ▸ Bookmarks) then it should be greyed out because you can't add it twice. – ændrük Oct 21 '13 at 21:14
  • @ændrük Okay, that does allow me to create new bookmarks. Thanks. However, opening "Files -> Bookmarks" doesn't allow me to remove anything - all controls are greyed out (I mentioned this in my original question). I want to be able to remove things like Videos and Pictures, etc. – Isaac Dontje Lindell Oct 21 '13 at 21:22
  • Ah! I understand. I was conflating the XDG user "places" with the bookmark system. Thank you, that makes much more sense. – Isaac Dontje Lindell Oct 22 '13 at 17:23
  • @IsaacDontjeLindell. Like it was said, the existing locations, including those in places, cannot be added. A highlighted directory is not the one that is linked to the Bookmark menu, so if you were in the Documents directory and selected another directory, then went into the Bookmarks menu, it would still be greyed out, because it thinks you intend on bookmarking documents. You must click into that directory, then go above to add the bookmark. I would suggest that the UI should also allow this bookmarking via a context menu item, which would have cleared it up for me. – Joel Teply Dec 28 '15 at 21:13
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I think I may have stumbled upon a way to add a bookmark for, say, the UbuntuOne folder.

First up, I connected to a SMB server, and I found that I was able to create a bookmark for this connection. This action created the Bookmarks entry in the left pane of Nautilus. Not sure if this is really necessary - it is just what I did.

Then I right-clicked on one of the folders in the Home folder (one I did not want to Bookmark say, Videos), and selected Copy to. This opened up the Select destination window.

I could then right-click on the folder I wanted to Bookmark and add it to the Bookmarks.

After that, I could rename, or remove, the bookmark if I wanted to.

Hereinoz
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If you want to completely remove Public Videos Pictures ... folders in home directory and their bookmarks in Nautilus

cd ~
sudoedit /etc/xdg/user-dirs.conf # Change `enabled=False` to `enabled=True`
rm -r Templates Public Videos Pictures Music Documents # remove unwanted folders
gedit ~/.config/user-dirs.dirs #Remove respective lines
sudo reboot
Hải Phong
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