Some useful tips for the XFCE desktop

Using Xfce Terminal instead of Konsole

Open "Xfce Menu" → "Settings" → "Preferred Applications", click on tab "Utilities" and choose "Xfce Terminal" (click images to enlarge):
XFCE Preferred Applications
 
XFCE Terminal setting

Automatic title for Xfce Terminal tabs

With bash you may use PROMPT_COMMAND for this purpose, so add the following line to your ~/.bashrc file:
[ "$TERM" = "xterm" ] && export PROMPT_COMMAND='echo -ne "\033]0;$USER@$HOSTNAME\007" '

Remove the close button from Xfce Terminal tabs

Open the file ~/.config/Terminal/terminalrc with your favourite text editor and set the entry MiscTabCloseButtons=FALSE.

Fix ugly fonts

Open "Xfce Menu" → "Settings" → "Appearance", click on tab "Fonts", activate "Enable anti-aliasing", and set "Hinting" to a proper value (click images to enlarge):
XFCE Appearance
 
XFCE Font setting

Add button for switching the keybord layout

Click right on the task bar, open "Add new items" and choose "Keyboard Layouts". You can add your preferred layouts in the new window.
xfce_keyboard1.png   xfce_keyboard2.png

Add button for locking the screen

Click right on the "Action Button" in the right corner of the task bar and choose "Properties". Select the entries "Log Out" and "Lock Screen" in the menu "Actions":
XFCE Action Button
 
XFCE Action Button

Add/change key combination for locking the screen

Open "Xfce Menu" → "Settings" → "Keyboard" and click on tab "Application Shortcuts". The default key combination for the screen locker xflock4 is [Ctrl][Alt][Delete] (click images to enlarge):
XFCE Appearance
 
XFCE Font setting

Fixing "Untrusted application launcher" messages for desktop icons

If you're receving a message "Untrusted application launcher" when clicking on a desktop icon you'll have to change the corresponding settings:
One method is to click on the button "Mark Executable" in the message window.
xfce_untrusted1.png

The other way is done by right-clicking the desktop icon and choosing "Properties". In the tab "Permissions" you can check "Allow this file to run as a program":
xfce_untrusted2.png

This topic: Linux > WebHome > TipsTricks > TipsXFCE
Topic revision: 2021-07-13, StefanHaller
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