PCMan File Manager (PCManFM) is a
file manager
A file manager or file browser is a computer program that provides a user interface to manage files and folders. The most common operations performed on files or groups of files include creating, opening (e.g. viewing, playing, editing or print ...
application, developed by Hong Jen Yee () from
Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northe ...
, which is meant to be a replacement for
GNOME Files
GNOME Files, formerly and internally known as Nautilus, is the official file manager for the GNOME desktop. Nautilus was originally developed by Eazel with many luminaries from the tech world including Andy Hertzfeld (Apple), chief architect ...
,
Dolphin
A dolphin is an aquatic mammal within the infraorder Cetacea. Dolphin species belong to the families Delphinidae (the oceanic dolphins), Platanistidae (the Indian river dolphins), Iniidae (the New World river dolphins), Pontoporiidae (t ...
and
Thunar. PCManFM is the standard file manager in
LXDE
LXDE (abbreviation for Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment) is a free desktop environment with comparatively low resource requirements. This makes it especially suitable for use on older or resource-constrained personal computers such as netbo ...
, also developed by the same author in conjunction with other developers. Since 2010, PCManFM has undergone a complete rewrite from scratch; build instructions, setup and configuration have changed in the process.
Released under the
GNU General Public License
The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a series of widely used free software licenses that guarantee end user
In product development, an end user (sometimes end-user) is a person who ultimately uses or is intended to ulti ...
, PCManFM is free software. It follows the specifications given by
Freedesktop.org for
interoperability
Interoperability is a characteristic of a product or system to work with other products or systems. While the term was initially defined for information technology or systems engineering services to allow for information exchange, a broader def ...
.
Dissatisfied with
GTK3
GTK (formerly GIMP ToolKit and GTK+) is a free and open-source cross-platform widget toolkit for creating graphical user interfaces (GUIs). It is licensed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License, allowing both free and proprieta ...
, Hong Jen Yee experimented with
Qt in early 2013 and released the first version of a Qt-based PCManFM on . He clarified, though, that does not indicate any departure from GTK in LXDE, saying: "The GTK and Qt versions will coexist". The new PCManFM-Qt is a core component of
LXQt
LXQt is a free and open source lightweight desktop environment. It was formed from the merger of the LXDE and Razor-qt projects.
Like its GTK predecessor LXDE, LXQt does not ship or develop its own window manager, instead LXQt lets the use ...
. In 2020 the
Arch Linux
Arch Linux () is an independently developed, x86-64 general-purpose Linux distribution that strives to provide the latest stable versions of most software by following a rolling-release model. The default installation is a minimal base system, ...
community ported PCManFM to GTK 3.
Features
PCManFM's features include:
* Full
GVfs support with seamless access to remote file systems (able to handle
sftp://, dav://, smb://, etc. when related back-ends of gvfs are installed.)
* Twin panel
* Thumbnails for pictures
* Desktop management - shows wallpaper and desktop icons
* Bookmarks
* Multilingual
* Tabbed browsing (similar to a
web browser
A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on ...
)
* Volume management (mount/unmount/eject, requires gvfs)
* Drag & drop support
* Files can be dragged among tabs
* File association (Default application)
* Provides the following views: icon, compact, detailed list, thumbnail, and tree on the left sidebar
See also
*
Comparison of file managers
The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of notable file managers.
General information
, -
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,
, 1985-04-01
, DOS
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, 1992
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, ...
*
LXDE
LXDE (abbreviation for Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment) is a free desktop environment with comparatively low resource requirements. This makes it especially suitable for use on older or resource-constrained personal computers such as netbo ...
*
LXQt
LXQt is a free and open source lightweight desktop environment. It was formed from the merger of the LXDE and Razor-qt projects.
Like its GTK predecessor LXDE, LXQt does not ship or develop its own window manager, instead LXQt lets the use ...
*
Thunar
*
SpaceFM
References
External links
*
Free file managers
LXDE
LXQt
Free software programmed in C
Software that uses Qt
File managers that use GTK
Software that was ported from GTK to Qt
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