KDE rearranges desktop icons

My single biggest frustration with KDE is that my desktop icons wander around. Every time the desktop initializes, a few of them move, and everything on the bottom half of the screen scoots up...this happens regardless of whether align-to-grid is on. This occurs even if I switch the desktop icons off and one while the system is up. Originally I thought it was a resolution problem, but I checked out my X settings and it seems that all is well. I also thought it could be a permissions problem--so I manually set everything in my home directory to be completely accessible by me and no one else. Still, no dice.

I'm using SimplyMEPIS 2004.04, but I've seen this on SuSE and Xandros as well. And it happens in both KDE 3.2 and 3.3.1 (which I'm currently running).

Does anyone have any ideas? It's almost enough to make me switch GUI's. Currently the only thing keeping me from Gnome is that KDE is a little better integrated. Although, since I use Firefox and Thunderbird, that integration isn't so critical for me.

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Originally Posted by elempoimen

My single biggest frustration with KDE is that my desktop icons wander around. Every time the desktop initializes, a few of them move, and everything on the bottom half of the screen scoots up...this happens regardless of whether align-to-grid is on. This occurs even if I switch the desktop icons off and one while the system is up. Originally I thought it was a resolution problem, but I checked out my X settings and it seems that all is well. I also thought it could be a permissions problem--so I manually set everything in my home directory to be completely accessible by me and no one else. Still, no dice.

I'm using SimplyMEPIS 2004.04, but I've seen this on SuSE and Xandros as well. And it happens in both KDE 3.2 and 3.3.1 (which I'm currently running).

Does anyone have any ideas? It's almost enough to make me switch GUI's. Currently the only thing keeping me from Gnome is that KDE is a little better integrated. Although, since I use Firefox and Thunderbird, that integration isn't so critical for me.

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I am having the same problem with KDS 3.3.2. It is so annoying. If you find a 'fix' let me know...!

bc

I never had that trouble before......

I have the problem as well. Did anyone ever come up with a solution?

I've checked "align to grid," and left it checked. This seems to stop the wandering. But I can't rearrange the icons the way I want. I have to accept the arrangement that results on boot. That's what will remain unchanged.

I think I have figured out the wandering icon problem.

Change the permissions on all of the desktop files.
cd /home/<user>/Desktop
su and password
chmod 666 *

Then, go to you desktop and shrink any loooooooooooooong icon names. For example, my new openoffice.org 1.9 write. That is too long. Shorten it to OOo writer. This is just an example. Shorten any long name. If you don't know how to do this, right click the icon and just change the name. Easy.

This worked for me. Let me know if works for you.

I tried this idea. It does not work.

Worse, I'm now having trouble opening desktop files and applications as a user. I can't open the file that I created for downloads, or documents. Also, for some reason, I get an error message trying to launch Firefox, which I renamed. Opera launches fine, by contrast.

I've not yet determined the extent to which desktop applications are now fouled. On the ones that I've checked so far, I can't identify any permissions problem.

Anyone got any ideas what to do?

I've now accessed the effect on my desktop, and fortunately it's limited.

1. For both the downloads and documents folders that I created, I am denied access. When I check properties, I find myself shown as the owner, however.

I'm not sure at this moment how to fix this. So, I switched to root, where I had access to each folder. I copied the contents of each into a new specially named folder, gave myself access as a user, and put links on the desktop. Thus, I've reproduced the folders, and maybe that's just the solution.

2. On Firefox, I was told KDEInit could not launch. I've since set up a new Firefox application on the desktop. That seems to launch fine, although I've not yet rebooted. Assuming no difficulties, I should be able to simply trash the first Firefox application.

3. My Ogle application link turned into a KWrite Ogle file. What should be the application seems to be the same thing. I have no idea what to do here.

4. I had an AbiWord file on the desktop, which I used, primarily, to paste things in from web surfing. It turned into an html file for something involving AbiWord. I trashed it, and created a new AbiWord file.

Thus, the Ogle problem seems the difficult one. I'm hoping I can get it reinstalled, if need be. I had difficulty with this to begin with.