How do have icons in a listview on Desktop

Question

For Windows user's there is a tweak to make your desktop icons in a list view as you can see here: http://www.howtogeek.com/?post_type=post&p=959

Icons normally on Desktop:

Icons in a listview:

I've managed to have icons in a listview on Macbook as well, which has this option as in-built functionality.

How can I achieve the same functionality on Ubuntu(Unity)?

Answer 1

Alright, answer is finally here. You have to change line or two in nautilus source and than recompile the source...

Text besides icons on Ubuntu Desktop

Text besides icons on Ubuntu Desktop

1-$ mkdir /home/nautilus-source & cd /home/nautilus-source

2-$ apt-get source nautilus #in my case it downloaded source for nautilus-3.4.2

3-$ sudo apt-get install fakeroot build-essential dpkg-dev

4-$ sudo apt-get build-dep nautilus

5-$ cd /home/nautilus-source/nautilus-3.4.2/

6-$ vim src/nautilus-desktop-icon-view.c

7-$ /NAUTILUS_TYPE_DESKTOP_ICON_VIEW

Change from:

g_object_new (NAUTILUS_TYPE_DESKTOP_ICON_VIEW, "window-slot", slot, "supports-zooming", FALSE, "supports-auto-layout", FALSE, "supports-scaling", TRUE,"supports-keep-aligned", TRUE, "supports-labels-beside-icons", FALSE, NULL);

to:

g_object_new (NAUTILUS_TYPE_DESKTOP_ICON_VIEW, "window-slot", slot, "supports-zooming", TRUE, "supports-auto-layout", FALSE, "supports-scaling", TRUE,"supports-keep-aligned", TRUE, "supports-labels-beside-icons", TRUE, NULL);

Line numbers in in src/nautilus-desktop-icon-view.c > 785-792

8-$ dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot -us -uc -nc -b

9-$ sudo dpkg -i ../nautilus_3.4.2-0ubuntu4_i386.deb

10-$ killall nautilus

11- Open your home folder from launcher -

12- Edit > Preferences > Views > Check Text Besides Icons

ps. also now Ctrl+Scroll - will zoom in zoom out desktop icons

ps2. you can also change location of launcher # edit src/nautilus-places-sidebar.c

Answer 2

You should be able to do it by clicking the desktop, and then selecting "view>list" in the global menu bar ;)

Answer 3

I'm on the process of trying it out. Check the link on the bottom of the page here:

http://ubuntuforums.org/archive/index.php/t-841696.html

Good luck! :)