https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=521288
Bug ID: 521288
Summary: Previews permanently lost when global/.directory view
properties file is missing
Classification: Applications
Product: dolphin
Version First 26.04.2
Reported In:
Platform: Arch Linux
OS: Linux
Status: REPORTED
Severity: normal
Priority: NOR
Component: general
Assignee: [email protected]
Reporter: [email protected]
CC: [email protected]
Target Milestone: ---
SUMMARY
Thumbnails/previews for all files (images, videos) permanently disappear and
are
replaced by generic MIME-type icons. The issue persists across Dolphin
restarts and
even reinstallation. Previews in Trash are unaffected.
STEPS TO REPRODUCE
Exact trigger is intermittent, but the conditions observed:
1. Open a folder with images/videos in Dolphin (Icons view, previews enabled)
2. Change icon size via Ctrl+Mouse Wheel (possibly reducing to a very small
size)
3. All thumbnails disappear, replaced by generic file-type icons
4. Restoring icon size, toggling "Show Previews", restarting Dolphin —
nothing helps
5. Reinstalling Dolphin (pacman -Rns dolphin && pacman -S dolphin) no longer
helps
EXPECTED BEHAVIOR
Previews should always regenerate after icon size changes. The global view
properties
file should never be removed/corrupted in a way that permanently disables
previews.
ACTUAL BEHAVIOR
Previews permanently disappear for all folders. Trash is unaffected because
it uses
its own view properties directory.
ROOT CAUSE FOUND
The file ~/.local/share/dolphin/view_properties/global/.directory was missing
entirely.
With GlobalViewProps=true (the default), Dolphin relies on this file for the
PreviewsShown setting. When the file is absent, Dolphin should fall back to
the
schema default (PreviewsShown=true per
dolphin_directoryviewpropertysettings.kcfg),
but it appears to treat the missing file as PreviewsShown=false instead.
WORKAROUND
Manually creating the file restores previews immediately:
mkdir -p ~/.local/share/dolphin/view_properties/global
cat > ~/.local/share/dolphin/view_properties/global/.directory << 'EOF'
[Dolphin]
PreviewsShown=true
Timestamp=2026,6,10,12,0,0
Version=4
ViewMode=0
[Settings]
HiddenFilesShown=false
EOF
Then restart Dolphin.
NOTES
- "Show Previews" toggle in the toolbar appears checked/enabled even when
previews
are broken — the UI state does not reflect the actual behavior
- Previews in Trash continue to work (Trash uses separate view properties in
~/.local/share/dolphin/view_properties/trash/)
- Deleting ~/.cache/thumbnails/ does not help
- The bug was initially "fixable" by reinstalling Dolphin, but at some point
that
stopped working (possibly because reinstall no longer touches
~/.local/share/dolphin/)
- Could not reliably reproduce the deletion of the global/.directory file on
demand,
but it has happened multiple times over weeks of use
POSSIBLE BUG SCENARIOS
1. Dolphin deletes global/.directory under certain Ctrl+Scroll conditions but
fails
to recreate it
2. Dolphin reads a missing global/.directory as PreviewsShown=false instead
of using
the kcfg default of true — this fallback logic is incorrect
SYSTEM INFORMATION
- OS: Arch Linux (rolling)
- Kernel: 7.0.11-arch1-1
- Plasma: 6.6.91
- Dolphin: 26.04.2
- Qt: 6.11.1
- KIO: 6.26.0
- kio-extras: 26.04.2
- ffmpegthumbs: 26.04.2
- kdegraphics-thumbnailers: 26.04.2
- Baloo: 6.26.0
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