Score:1

Missing desktop icons after upgrade to 22.04

mx flag

While on 20.04, I had some *.desktop files in ~/Desktop. Those worked and properly displayed an icon on my desktop.

After the upgrade to 22.04, the icons are gone. Google told me the files should be in ~/.local/share/applications, so I moved them there, but that hasn't helped.

desktop-file-validate (from desktop-file-utils package) says the files are valid.

How do I get my desktop icons back?

Score:2
cn flag

Your upgrade probably went slightly wrong. The Gnome Shell extension that provides icons on the desktop may not have been activated, or may not have been correctly installed.

  • Install gnome-shell-extension-prefs. Open that tool by searching "Extensions" in the Application Overview. In the section "Build-in", check whether the "Desktop Icons NG" extension is listed. If yes, it is probably turned off. Turning it on should make the icons appear.

  • If the extension is not there, quit "Extensions", install the extension with the command sudo apt install gnome-shell-extension-desktop-icons-ng and turn the extension on using "Extensions".

Jorn avatar
mx flag
Exactly right! BTW, I also had to move the files back to `~/Desktop`, so that location was correct in the first place.
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