Is it possible to backup the custom keyboard shortcuts and restore them when doing a fresh install?
2 Answers
Gnome-Control-Center (used by Unity and Gnome Shell) stores its key bindings in the per-user Dconf database directories /org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/ and /org/gnome/settings-daemon/plugins/media-keys/ (source).
The easiest way to keep them across system re-installations is to keep the per-user configuration directories (
~/.configor more specifically~/.config/dconf/userfor Dconf only). Most of the time it's not necessary or desirable to purge the per-user configuration files anyway.If you can't or won't keep your old Dconf database you can use the
dconfcommand to export (“dump”) parts of it into a file and import (“load”) it later. The relevant Dconf directories are/org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/for pre-defined shortcuts and/org/gnome/settings-daemon/plugins/media-keys/custom-keybindings/for custom, user-defined shortcuts.
The following example saves the above Dconf directories to two files
keybindings.dconfandcustom-keybindings.dconfand then restores them from the same files:dconf dump '/org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/' > keybindings.dconf dconf dump '/org/gnome/settings-daemon/plugins/media-keys/custom-keybindings/' > custom-keybindings.dconf dconf load '/org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/' < keybindings.dconf dconf load '/org/gnome/settings-daemon/plugins/media-keys/custom-keybindings/' < custom-keybindings.dconf
If you find that you export your keybindings often, it might be convenient to script the required steps.
answered Nov 2, 2016 at 23:43
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Thanks for the explanation. I moved the user file to user.bk and my custom shortcuts still work (needs a reboot because a new file was created & seems to restore my preferences?) Also for
dconfthat directory (/org) doesn't exist Commented Nov 5, 2016 at 21:52 -
Where did you get the idea that there's no
/org/directory in the Dconf database? Both Unity and Gnome wouldn't work very well without it. Commented Nov 5, 2016 at 21:57 -
Because I tried
cding into it & your command saves an empty file Commented Nov 5, 2016 at 22:03 -
2You can't “change the working directory” to be a Dconf database directory because they're not part of a file system. Instead they are key prefixes in a hierarchical key-value store. Yes, the Dconf database is stored as a file but its contents aren't files. Commented Nov 6, 2016 at 4:15
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3For custom bindings, the path is
/org/gnome/settings-daemon/plugins/media-keys/custom-keybindings/. I'm on Debian Buster running Gnome 3.30.2.– SufianCommented Aug 27, 2019 at 3:15
Case you are a fan of Xubuntu (xfce), here is the clue:
/home/$USER/.config/xfce4/xfconf
gsettings. It is best to save the "setting" of these as a command. See askubuntu.com/questions/597395/… for example; all you need to find is the one you edited ;)