Dear all,
I try to decrypt a file, but the system was reinstalled and I don't remember which software that I used to decrypt it. Fortunately, the data file is still preserved including the private key. The key is store in ~/.gnupg directory, but I'm not sure though if that is associated with the file.

The file extension is pgp. I remember that to encrypt the file, I just do the right click from the GUI. How do I figure it out which software with which key to open? I was thinking about seahorse application, but I'm not sure.

I'm using ubuntu 18.10

regards

edit:

inside .gnupg directory:
directories:
- openpgp-revocs.d
- private-keys-v1.d
files:
- pubring.kbx
- random_seed
- trustdb.gpg

Instructions on the GPG site.

You get other suggestions by searching for site:ubuntu.com decrypt file. For example, https://help.ubuntu.com/community/GnuPrivacyGuardHowto.

EDIT: You probably used a file browser extension named seahorse-nautilus to encrypt the file. Install and enable it, then you should have a decrypt option in the context menu.

DISCLAIMER: All of the above found by googling.

1 members found this post helpful.

according the instruction, the output decrypted file has gpg extension instead of pgp. Can gnupg output an pgp file?

Extensions are just strings. You can rename the file .exe and still decrypt it.

There is no harm in trying.

1 members found this post helpful.

actually I have Seahorse and Nautilus installed, but when I do right click on a file, it doesn't show "encrypt" label on the menu despite the fact that seahorse-nautilus is installed. How so?

all right. I reboot the system, and seahorse is on nautilus. I copy the .gnupg directory from the old data to the new system. It works now. @berndbausch, thanks

I am glad you got your data back!