2

I use Ubuntu 16.04 LTS whose GUI allows customization. These include

  1. Launcher Icon Size
  2. Behaviour of the launcher (hides, size of launcher, reveal sensitivity)
  3. System Language
  4. My dual display settings, their positioning
  5. My items docked on the launcher

Basically, all such settings I applied to the system via GUI for my ease.

I want some sort of a hack to back up such settings to a file and reapply them when I reinstall the OS.

Volker Siegel
  • 13,295
Denis
  • 337

3 Answers3

6

They are all stored as config files in ~/.config/ or ~/.<software-name>

So if you copy over your home directory, or at least that (hidden) folder, you should see most(all?) your settings restored

Robert Riedl
  • 4,401
3

tar is your friend.

I recently updated from mint 17.3 to 18.2 and I wanted it to be as smooth as a transition as possible and it was thanks to tar.

  1. Create a backup of your home directory
    • tar -cvf home_backup.tar ~/*
    • ~/* is all the files in your home directory
  2. Put the tarball on a separate drive or machine
  3. Extract the tarball right ontop of your home directory (in new machine)
    • cd ~
    • tar -xf home_backup.tar
market_zero
  • 126
0

My anwer is restricted to a certain Desktop Manager: it concerns XFCE.

Saving all XFCE Desktop settings

The settings of the XFCE Manager are at /home/<user_name>/.config/xfce4/. Therefore, if you copy the whole directory and then transfer it into a fresh XFCE installation it should work. I guess that for other Desktop Managers (such as Gnome or Unity) an analogous directory must exist.

Saving only XFCE Desktop Panels

That said, if you were only concerned with thee GUI panels, again in XFCE, you can back them up through the GUI. Do as follows:

  1. Go to the panel and right click with the mouse on it: Panel > Panel Preferences enter image description here

  2. Click on Backup and restore. There you can save the current configuration in the path you indicate or load a stored backup. Per default the backups are stored in /home/<your user>/.local/share/xfpanel-switch/

    enter image description here

I hope it help someone.

loved.by.Jesus
  • 667