Hi guys,

I really like KDE 4 and I really like Xfce... so I tend to switch between both DEs quite often. One day I might come up with a decision which one to ditch, but for now I want to use them side by side.

The problem is that somehow Xfce seems to write its autostart programs like for example "Xfce Power Manager" somewhere where KDE 4 picks it up. So when I log in to KDE 4, I have those "Desktop Files" loaded:


Which is especially stupid in the case of the power manager. Ever had your machine managed by two power managers at the same time?

So now my questions:

1.) What is a "desktop file" and where is it located?

2.) How can I either make Xfce write to another directory where KDE doesn't pick up the desktop files or...

3.) How can I make KDE ignore Xfce's desktop files.

I'm using KDE 4.2.1 under Arch Linux and choose between KDE or Xfce via KDM.

TIA,
Blackhole

Xfce is likely using the Desktop Agnostic place to store the startup files for your user.
Where exactly are the startup items being placed by Xfce?

bcooksley wrote:Xfce is likely using the Desktop Agnostic place to store the startup files for your user.
Where exactly are the startup items being placed by Xfce?

I don't know. That's part of my question. I don't know anything about desktop files and such.
However I think it's ~/.config/autostart. At least I've found one of the guilty files there. I'll do a quick test....

//edit: Yupp, it's definitely ~/.config/autostart. Is this directory used by KDE as well? How can I change that?

That entry is specified by the XDG standard, which KDE complies with. I think there are some environment variables that affect it, but it will cause other issues as well such as applications that use the XDG folders to save data will have different configurations between KDE and Xfce.

Thanks a lot for pointing me in the right direction bcooksley.

In the Arch Linux forum someone gave me another tipp which finally brought the solution:

Go to ~/.config/autostart, open the desktop file with Kate, add "OnlyShowIn=XFCE" and that's it.
You can also add a whole semicolon-separated list of desktop's like "OnlyShowIn=XFCE;GNOME".

Thanks again cook. Greetings to lovely New Zealand. Man, living there I would hardly have time for Linux. Stunning countryside down there!