I have been a Linux user (Ubuntu Intrepid with a Gnome GUI) for about two weeks, so i would like first of all to ask everybody to be a bit patient with me.

I have been browsing some fora online and have been a bit surprised to find that most users seem to be happy with the file name truncating feature in Nautilus. I am not. For a host of reasons (passing texts back and forth between authors and editors, song names, torrents downloading, etc.) i am happy with long file names and i would like to keep them. On the other hand, i like being able to see as many files as possible, so i like using the compactest viewing mode possible as well.

This did not use to be a problem under XP, which i just recently migrated from. There the user could view files with very small icons grouped in columns as broad as the longest file name. This seems to work under Thunar, but not under Nautilus, and try as hard as i could, i could not find an option [through the GUI] that would allow me to address it under Nautilus. I would LIKE to stick to Nautilus though, because apparently:

1. Thunar does not know how to only display the path to the directory currently being viewed, but splatters huge browsing buttons all across the screen, as well, (and i do not know how to turn this off either) and

2. More importantly, selecting a bunch of song files in Thunar and hitting enter results in only one file being played (and i do not know how to turn this off either yet again).

So, please, anybody:

HOW DO YOU MAKE NAUTILUS DISPLAY FULL FILE NAMES?

Thank you.

Not being a gnome/nautilus/thunar user, I can't help you with most of this. But I may be able to point you in the right direction on one point; the playing of multiple files.

Almost certainly it has something to do with the way the file/mime-type associations are set up. In konqueror, when you associate a filetype with a command, you can also include a variable to control the way filenames are passed to it. For example "audio/mp3 mplayer %F".

It's the %F variable that passes the filename(s) along. There are several options you can use. AIUI, %f means the currently selected file and %F means all selected files. %d likewise is the currently selected directory and %D is all selected directories. Finally %u and %U are for passing single and multiple URIs, which could include things like web addresses and such.

I'm not sure if thunar follows the same conventions, but it probably has something similar.

You might also look at the application flags, especially for audio players. Some players respond to new requests by immediately canceling the currently-playing media. So I like to also have an entry that uses the --enqueue option of whatever media player I want to use so I can build a playlist in it.