Eckhard M. Jäger

Thumbnailer for the Gnome Desktop

Monday, 8. June 2009, 17:17:21

thumbnails, nautilus, gnome, thumbnailer, preview, desktop

After many different posts about thumbnailers for various file formats, here is a complete collection for visual pimping your Nautilus. This is refered too Ubuntu Jaunty 9.04.

Thumbnails for Photoshop PSD and GIMP XCF files
Download the Gloobus DEB packages, they include a pixbuf loader for Photoshop PSD and GIMP XCF files. Install the package. After installation open a terminal:

gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/image@x-psd/command -t string "evince-thumbnailer -s %s %u %o" 
gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/image@x-psd/enable -t boolean "True"

NOTE: The pixbuf loader for Photoshop PSD and GIMP XCF files add support for these formats to the hole Gnome Desktop. Thumbnail generation works via Evince that will not load PSD files since Gnome 2.26.

Thumbnails for Flash SWF files
Install the packages "libswfdec-0.8-0" and "swfdec-gnome" to get thumbnails of Flash SWF files in Nautilus. By installing "gstreamer0.8-swfdec" you can view them in Totem too.

Thumbnails of PPT, ODP, DOC and ODT office files
Install the package "libgsf-bin" and make sure the package "imagemagick" is installed.

Thumbnails of digital camera RAW files
Install the package "gnome-raw-thumnailer" to get thumbnails of various RAW files: *.raw,*.cs1,*.dc2,*.dcr,*.nef and much, much more.

Thumbnails of video files
If you like to get thumbnails of various video files you have to install the package "ffmpegthumbnailer". This will add thumbnails for any video format that is supported by FFMPEG.

Thumbnails of Adobe Illustrator files
Via the Evince thumbnailer you can create thumbnails of Adobe Illustrator too:

gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/application@illustrator/command -t string "evince-thumbnailer -s %s %u %o" 
gconftool-2 --set /desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/application@illustrator/enable -t boolean "True"

You can modify/ enable/ disable the thumbnailers too using the configuration editor GConf. Via the preferences of Nautilus you can setup conditions when and where a thumbnail is genarated.

UPDATE 090699

Thumbnails for Blender 3D *.blend files
Yorik post a comment about a thumnailer for Blender for the Gnome Desktop (Thanks!). I struggle through the italian message board and tried it out but didn't get it running. So i modified it and created my own version that running on Ubuntu 9.04:
- Download my package of the Blender thumbnailer for Gnome
- extract it
- open the folder of the archive in a terminal
- run "sudo ./install" to install it
- After a logout/ login you should get thumbnails for *.blend files

^F-Spot next steps

Comments

Anonymous # 9. June 2009, 06:18

Andreas writes:

Brilliant roundup, those little preview icons really make life a little bit easier! Unfortunately your tags are covered by the right column so that it isn't possible to read and copy them at full length (reduce width a bit or turn of margin and padding).

The only preview i'm missing is for font files. It would be really great to see a small portion of a font in the icons. But I haven't found anything useable yet - perhaps it is time to start something myself.

area42 # 9. June 2009, 07:56

Hi,

the code view can be scrolled, selected and copied.

Normally font files has a preview by default. May check if it is enabled using GConf:
/desktop/gnome/thumbnailers/application@x-font-ttf

Check this too:
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=22517

Anonymous # 9. June 2009, 14:49

Yorik writes:

There is also a blender thumbnailer for gnome
http://www.kino3d.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=83323#83323
But I don't use gnome, so I don't know how well it works...

Anonymous # 13. June 2009, 11:45

Tobias writes:

Here you can find a thumbnailer for Xara Xtremes XAR files:
http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthread.php?t=34747

And here one for CHM files
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=7280707

Perhaps there is need for a place to collect thumbnailer.

Anonymous # 5. July 2009, 15:03

Yorik writes:

And FreeCAD - http://free-cad.sf.net - now has a built-in thumbnailer too!

Anonymous # 11. July 2009, 12:40

Anonymous writes:

Hey thanks people, wonderful aggregation there!!!

area42 # 11. July 2009, 15:06

Hey guys thanks for alle the hints i will look at them!

Anonymous # 29. July 2009, 14:59

Anonymous writes:

I can't get the PSD example to work in Ubuntu Jaunty.

area42 # 29. July 2009, 21:15

the psd pix buf loader needs to be fixed for th evince thumbnailer. it work to view psd files with apps like eog but it failed with evince. drop a line to jan to fix it:
http://my.opera.com/jandudek/about/