Hello Qubes community,
First week at Qubes, and I’m new to Linux as well (another Windows and macOS refugee)
I can see the files extensions for images on dom0 File Manager “although, I’m not sure how I enabled it or by default” but not for text files, I can’t show them as well inside other qubes.like personal and vault “extensions like .txt - .jpg - .zip - .config - .bat… etc”
On File manager I checked all Preferences / configure custome actions “which I don’t know what it is” settings / preferances, as well properties which I know it has nothing to do with extensions but just in case.
I’m new to Linux as well and I have learned that Linux doesn’t ‘do’ file types the same way Windows does.
Linux uses ‘mimetypes’ which is like file metadata if I understand it correctly and file extensions (example: .jpg) doesn’t influence what type of file it is.
As an example, in the attached screenshot, I removed “.svg” from one file but it still recognizes it as an svg.
TL;DR If you want classic extensions, write them as a part of file names yourself
File extensions aren’t real. They only exist if you write them yourself as a part of a file name, but even at that point they are a reminder for you made by you. Many programs (especially the ones made for use with specific file type, like media players, image editors, archivers, etc.) can tell the real file type regardless of the name.
Text files are just plain text, they aren’t encoded or hashed or anything (from the perspective of your system, they are encrypted on the drive of course) so there’s no reason for them to have an extension, unless, again, you want a reminder that the text is written in a specific way
p.s. File extensions nevertheless are used by, for example, thunar (the file manager), but even thunar will display the correct type if a file doesn’t have an extension. It even shows types of text files if they explain what they are or how to use them (like a shell script having #!/bin/bash in the first line)
Not metadata (nothing is written on the file), just a result of automatic type detection
p.p.s. If you, @atlantis, want type shown in thunar (the same way as on Villa’s screenshot), select “list view” in thunar’s “view” menu and configure columns by right-clicking them (if you don’t have type column by default)
File extensions doesn’t matter in Linux (and in other Unix-like) operating system, they are nothing more as part of the file name.
Other as in MS Windows (that determines the type of the file regarding to his “extension”) it has no special meaning in unix/linux.
It exists some common rules (like .sh for shell scripts, .so for shared libraries and so on), but these have no special meaning from the OS point of view.
Regardless, it exists some exceptions from that rules on application level, for example compression programs like zip, 7zip and so on.
These programs often uses suffixes to separate the compressed version of a file from the uncompressed one they replace. Compression-programs will often complain about incorrect suffix, even though the file actually is a compressed file of the type it should handle.
I’m aware of write down the extension as a part of file name.
File Manager - View - then show file details/type.
Well, it is true that no matter what extension you add, doesn’t change the file type, yet it was a way on Windows to play around with things, like change a a photo from .jpb to .png as required by something and it works , even, remove the whole extension and the file looks like unkown to any other application, “sure, you didn’t change the file type” - little tricks that I guess won’t work on linux.
, even, remove the whole extension and the file looks like unkown to any other application, “sure, you didn’t change the file type” - little tricks that I guess won’t work on linux.