[Libreoffice-bugs] [Bug 124853] LO .desktop files belong to root and not user

[bugzilla-daemon at bugs.documentfoundation.org]

https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=124853

--- Comment #6 from alucardnoir at gmail.com ---
(In reply to Jean-Baptiste Faure from comment #5)
> Why? It's easy to copy a desktop file and change its proprietary if you want
> add an icon on your desktop.

The created .desktop files belong to root. That means the user need to be
logged in as root to be able to do so in the graphical user environment. That's
something that is generally discouraged. But I guess that's not a problem if
you're mostly a terminal user. I am not so it is a problem for me.

> Which LO icon? Where do you take it from?

In the case of Solus LO icons are to be found in the budgie menu. Installing
from the GUI software centre or via terminal though eopkg directly will create
working icons in the budgie menu. Solus offers the ability to use desktop icons
and to pin icons in a icons task list. This is as simple as drag and dropping
or pinning.

This did not work on Solus, and as another user reported on KDE Neon because
LO's default .desktop icons are registered as belonging to root as opposed to
the user. And here is what the solus dev that diagnosed this said:

"The issue with LibreOffice desktop files being owned as root is the result of
LibreOffice actually having a build system which installs the desktop files
into the COMPLETELY INCORRECT LOCATION, which is
/usr/lib/libreoffice/share/xdg, then symlinking to /usr/share/applications/. As
a result, the desktop file on the desktop is a symlink to that xdg directory,
which is owned by root. The correct procedures would be:

File a bug upstream to have the LO desktop files be installed into the correct
directory instead of symlinking"

You CAN'T change the properties of a file belonging to root unless you are
logged in as root or unless you use the terminal with su/sudo. And in the case
of something like the budgie taskmenu, that's more hassle then it's worth.

> Did you try to do the same thing with the desktop file of another
> application installed system-wide ?

Yes, and there was no such problem. The problem was diagnosed by the Solus devs
that maintain the LO package in their repo and I was sent this way to report
it. Since then, the problem has been "solved" by the person maintaining the Lo
package for Solus. But that's more of an alteration of the default LO install
parameters in Solus then a solution to the bug.

Also, please don't take this the wrong way but I'm frankly surprised anybody on
here still cares since it's been close to a year since I made this report.

Frankly all that need to be done is ask to whom do the files in
/usr/lib/libreoffice/share/xdg belong to and if that's the correct location for
.desktop files to be put in. The solus devs seem to think the files under
/usr/lib/ should belong to root, while, as someone else stated on Ubuntu they
seem to belong to the user. I unfortunately don't know enough about the Linux
file system to be able to tell you who is right. The people that make the
OS/distro I was using a year ago and am still using - Solus - seem to think the
files there should belong to root and not the user. They also think .desktop
files shouldn't be placed where LibreOffice puts them. Since I don't know
enough about the linux file system all I can do is foreword to you what they
told me. If they're wrong, then this was a Solus problem to begin with and I'm
sorry for having wasted your time. If they're not you should probably have
someone that knows the linux file system and who develops Distros have a look
at how LO is built to see if there are other such problmes.

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