I recently installed EndeavourOS with the LXQt desktop environment, and I am encountering an issue with the pcmanfm-qt file manager regarding sidebar bookmarks.
The Issue: Whenever I add bookmarks to the sidebar in PCManFM-Qt (such as Downloads, Pictures, or Documents folders) for quick access, they are saved and work perfectly during the current session. However, as soon as I close the application and open it again, all the custom bookmarks I added are completely gone.
Video Demonstration: I have recorded a short video showing the exact behavior described above: https://youtu.be/VeF9JHRLMYU
Could anyone help me resolve this issue? It seems like the settings are not being saved properly on exit after a fresh installation.
I appreciate the input, but I doubt it’s purely a Wayland-specific issue. I’ve been running LXQt sessions on Wayland for quite a while across multiple distributions (Arch Linux, CachyOS, and Lubuntu) and never experienced this behavior. It always worked flawlessly there. This is the very first time I’m encountering it, so it feels more like a distro-specific bug or a missing session configuration rather than a Wayland limitation.
To answer your question: no, I don’t use any kind of session restore, and I don’t keep the same session between logins — every login starts a completely fresh session. In fact, LXQt doesn’t even have a built-in session restore feature to begin with; it’s still an open feature request upstream (lxqt/lxqt discussion #2840), and under Wayland it can only be implemented by the compositor (I’m on labwc, which doesn’t do session restore). I haven’t installed any third-party tool for it either.
I also noticed something that I think rules out the session theory completely: PCManFM-Qt correctly saves every other setting — view mode (icon/list), window size, sidebar width, etc. — after closing and reopening it. The only thing that disappears is the sidebar bookmarks. So the config file is clearly being written and read normally; it’s just the bookmarks that are not being persisted.
I recorded a second video demonstrating exactly this: I change the view mode and layout, close the app, reopen it, and the changes are kept — while the bookmarks are still gone: https://youtu.be/4QxImqS7aAA
Any idea what could cause the bookmarks specifically not to be saved?
Here it works. I use greetd-regreet en gtklock, op in terminal .config, do ls -la , check which owner pcmanfm-qt folder has? Could try backup that folder
Thanks for your patience. Here is the full timeline with exact commands and outputs:
Following your hint, I checked the ownership:
$ ls -la ~/.config/pcmanfm-qt/ drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Aug 3 16:44 default drwxr-xr-x 2 ali ali 4096 Aug 4 18:23 lxqt
The “default” folder was owned by root. I just remembered that right after installing the system I had launched PCManFM-Qt as root with:
xhost +local:root sudo -E dbus-launch pcmanfm-qt
I fixed the ownership:
$ sudo chown -R ali:ali ~/.config/pcmanfm-qt $ ls -la ~/.config/pcmanfm-qt/ drwxr-xr-x 2 ali ali 4096 Aug 4 21:38 default drwxr-xr-x 2 ali ali 4096 Aug 4 21:34 lxqt
But the bookmarks still were not saved when running as my normal user.
I then deleted the whole ~/.config/pcmanfm-qt folder and rebooted. The folder was recreated owned by ali, but adding bookmarks as a normal user still fails — they disappear after reopening.
Out of curiosity, I launched PCManFM-Qt as root again (same xhost + sudo -E dbus-launch commands), added a bookmark, closed and reopened it — and this time the bookmark persisted.
So the situation is: as root the bookmarks are saved; as ali they are not, even when ~/.config/pcmanfm-qt is fully owned by ali. Also, on a second laptop with a fresh EndeavourOS + LXQt + labwc install (same package versions), everything works fine as a normal user.
Two questions:
Where does PCManFM-Qt / libfm-qt actually store the bookmarks on disk?
Why would saving fail for a normal user even with correct ownership of ~/.config/pcmanfm-qt? Is there another path involved that could still be root-owned?
I would backup those folder if you start pcmanfm-qt it should make a new folder.. with sudo etc stuf always watch out, withkn pcmanfm-qt you setup qtermknal.also.lxqt-sudo stuf.. better not sudo pcmanfm
The real culprit was ~/.gtk-bookmarks — it was owned by root (created when I first ran PCManFM-Qt with sudo -E dbus-launch pcmanfm-qt right after installing). PCManFM-Qt stores its bookmarks in that file, and after running sudo chown ali:ali ~/.gtk-bookmarks to make the file mine again, the problem is completely solved.
I also ran these commands to make sure nothing else in my home is owned by root, and this was the result:
Also, one technical question: since PCManFM-Qt is built on Qt, why does it store its bookmarks in ~/.gtk-bookmarks (which seems like a GTK standard) instead of a Qt-specific location?
