Where Does Nemo Store Settings and Actions?
Nemo splits settings across dconf, ~/.config/nemo, and ~/.local/share/nemo. Bookmarks stay in the shared GTK file.
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Nemo keeps its state in four places and each one surprises someone. Preferences live in dconf under /org/nemo. Config snippets and actions live in two dot folders. Bookmarks live in a GTK file Nemo shares with other apps.
Per-folder view settings are the odd one out. Those sit in gvfs-metadata under ~/.local/share and do not copy well between machines. Back up the three text-side locations and let folder views rebuild themselves.
Where Nemo stores this, by platform
/org/nemo/ (dconf)
Main preferences tree. Dump with dconf dump /org/nemo/, reset with dconf reset -f on the same path.
~/.local/share/nemo
Actions, scripts, and extensions. Back up alongside the dconf dump for a full restore.
Frequently asked questions
How do I migrate Nemo settings to a new install?
Run dconf dump /org/nemo/ and copy ~/.config/nemo plus ~/.local/share/nemo. Restore with dconf load on the new machine. Per-folder views live in gvfs-metadata and rarely transfer cleanly.
Where are Nemo bookmarks stored?
Edit ~/.config/gtk-3.0/bookmarks. Nemo shares that file with Nautilus and every GTK file chooser, so one edit updates all of them.
Where do Nemo custom actions go?
Put action files in ~/.local/share/nemo/actions. Scripts go in the scripts subfolder. They appear in the context menu on next right click.
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