How to Fix File Dialog in COSMIC

Pop!_OS just released it’s new and stable COSMIC DE, and better yet, it came with ARM image! I can’t help myself but straight away wiping my linux disk into a brand new Pop!_OS.

And everything went smooth! Except it came with broken open file dialog, like I can’t open any files in any apps. There are some open issues with it that has been closed, but I think it’s x86_64 specific?

Instead of trying to fix it, I’m just going to replace the open file dialog, turns out it’s really doable!

Install your second open file dialog

Open a root shell and install one:

sudo apt install xdg-desktop-portal-kde

Here I am using kde, but I think you can pick any from xdg-desktop-portal-*

Switch your open file dialog

Here’s the magic, open this config file:

mkdir ~/.config/xdg-desktop-portal
vim ~/.config/xdg-desktop-portal/portals.conf

Edit it like:

[preferred]
org.freedesktop.impl.portal.FileChooser=kde

Then save it, then restart the XDG portal

systemctl restart --user xdg-desktop-portal

You should have a working open file dialog by now!