Bug: 'Show Download Folder' button opens media player instead of a file browser (Linux Mint)

[Jackalaq]

Your question

When pressing the 'Show Download Folder' button beside a downloaded file, a media player is always opened instead. The download folder (i.e. not the relevant file) is actually opened, but in a media player, rather than a file browser, so the player starts playing the first file in that folder.

Addon & CoApp version and details

Linux Mint 21.2 Victoria
version: 9.3.7.0
target: mozilla
channel: beta
lang: en-GB
coapp: {"found":true,"path":"/opt/vdhcoapp/vdhcoapp","version":"2.0.19","new_version":false}
license: {"unneeded":true}
platform: x86-64 linux
UA: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:136.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/136.0
{
"privacy_accept": true,
"used_history_button": true,
"download_directory": "/home/user/Downloads/Music",
"last_download_directory": {
"__serializer_tag": "option_some",
"__serializer_value": {
"__serializer_tag": "primitive",
"__serializer_value": "/home/user/Downloads/Music/"
}
},
"never_show_no_incognito_msg_again": true,
"view_options": {
"all_tabs": false,
"low_quality": false,
"sort_by_status": true,
"sort_reverse": true,
"show_button_clean": true,
"show_button_clean_all": false,
"show_button_convert_local": true,
"hide_downloaded": false
},
"default_action": "download",
"use_sidebar": true,
"open_count_store": 20,
"successfull_dl": 47,
"download_history": {
"__serializer_tag": "map",
"__serializer_value": []
}
}

[GrampaWildWilly]

I do not work for VDH. I'm just another user.

It works as expected on Windows. You may have hit a problem that exists only in Linux. Not that that helps you much, but it might help the dev.

[GrampaWildWilly]

I take that back. I have tested the buttons on the VDH History page in the past & they worked fine. But I tried them just now & they do nothing. The Play button is supposed to queue up the downloaded file into the VLC playlist but it doesn't. The other button is supposed to open the Windows file manager but it doesn't. I have my suspicion about why it doesn't work. The file name showing in the VDH History is the default name that VDH first proposed when I was launching the download. But since I did a Download As (which I always do), I changed the file name. So the file name showing in the VDH History does not match the real file name on my hard drive. I admit this is pure speculation but I'm just another user. I can only speculate on how things really work. Or, in this case, how they don't work.

On the other hand, my most recent Windows 11 maintenance (which brought me up to Windows 11 Pro 64-bit version 24H2 build 26100.3915) did make the file manager look a bit different. Maybe the old APIs got a tweak & VDH has not reacted to whatever changed. Maybe. Again, I'm just another dumb user guessing at things.

[GrampaWildWilly]

Weeeellllllll......... It's not that simple. I just downloaded something else & I was able to use both halves of the green button from my VDH History. They both worked like they're supposed to. But the older history entry still doesn't work. And this new download was also a Download As with a change to the file name. I must also point out that I was wrong about the older history entry. It actually does show the changed file name, not the originally proposed file name offered when VDH started to process my download request. Sorry. My mistake.

So this seems to be an intermittent problem.

You know what? I just did something that may be a clue. I did a Reload extension, something I always do after I complete a download. That made the green button in the VDH history go dead. So the green button works, both halves of it, only until the next time you restart VDH. That could be via Reload extension like I just did. It could also be via closing all browser tabs. When you come back in a fresh browser session, the green button in the VDH history is non-functional. That's not really the way it ought to work. If a VDH refresh or a browser restart are supposed to take away the function of the green button, then you should remove it from the history. But that's not the solution I would recommend. I would recommend that you make the green button work so long as the downloaded file resides in the location where you downloaded it & continues to have the same file name as what VDH gave it on the download. If the file is still there, the green button should work regardless of whatever refreshes you might do.

I say this is a bug.

[GrampaWildWilly]

Also, the right half of the green button doesn't really function the way you'd expect, but I say this is a shortcoming of the APIs Microsoft provides with the file manager. I normally have one file manager window open with a dozen tabs set to various different directories. Usually, one of those dozen is where I've done my download. But the right half of the VDH green button just switches focus to the file manager. It does not also move the tab in focus to the download directory. If I happen to have the file manager window showing the download directory, then it looks like the green button works. But that's an accident. If I have the file manager window showing one of the other tabs, that's what VDH switches to. This is something I've discussed before. This is entirely the fault of Windows. If the file manager had better APIs, VDH could take advantage of them & function intuitively. But that's not what we have so it doesn't work properly through no fault of VDH.

[bonesnap]

Weird, I'm on Linux Mint and it works as expected for me.

I'm using LM 22 though. Also Xfce desktop which uses the Thunar file manager. @Jackalaq what's your desktop environment and file manager?

[Jackalaq]

Linux Mint v21.3 and the Mate Desktop Environment so Caja file manager
(Any other Noobs needing to find out their Desktop Environment? Open a terminal (Ctrl-Alt-T) then type echo $XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP to find out)

[Mattmjs]

What interface are you using, The popup menu has two sizes , the smaller version and a larger one or the side bar.
That would be useful to know.

[Jackalaq]

Side Bar, New UI (though I knew and loved the LegacyUI)