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**Schwarzer Kater** · Apr 30, 2020, 02:26 PM

I never had this problem, but I made a screenshot of the standard settings in system settings (section: applications) for you, that show when I search for "xls":

Do your settings look the same (except for the German ;-) )?

**Red Squirrel** · Apr 30, 2020, 02:32 PM

Yeah looks the same. But when it stops remembering I will check again to see if it changed. It's like if the settings aren't sticking after a reboot or something.

**Red Squirrel** · May 01, 2020, 09:32 AM

Ok so the association got lost again overnight. Not even a reboot, it just seems to revert after a while. When I go in that dialog it's not there anymore. Something seems to be causing it to reset somehow.

**oshunluvr** · May 01, 2020, 10:01 AM

I believe LibreOffice inserts those when installed. You might re-install LO? Really weird that some running background process is removing them.

**jlittle** · May 01, 2020, 04:13 PM

There's some funky relationship between generic types and the more specific ones. Maybe at startup something propagates a generic association to the rest it may apply to. F. ex. text/plain seems to apply to many more derived types. I'd really like to understand this.

**Red Squirrel** · May 02, 2020, 10:40 AM

One thing I never liked is how Linux seems to ignore file extensions. For example I would like .txt to open with a basic text editor, and .cpp, .h .php etc to open with kate. I don't care what's inside the file, I want it to go by the extension. Have not played much with that in Kubuntu yet but I assume it's probably the same as all other distros where it tries to figure out the file type based on what's in it. I feel it's a messy way to go about it, extensions make more sense.

But yeah so this issue is odd, it seems to reset after a rather short amount of time, even without a reboot. I get the "choose application" dialog, set it, and check the box so it remembers. It will remember for about 10 minutes if I close and open the file again, then revert back to poping that dialog the next time I open an excel file. doc files seem to be ok, it seems to be specific to .xlsm so far.

Anyone know the name of the package for Libre Office? It's not libeoffice I tried. I will try to uninstall and reinstall to see if it fixes the issue.

**kubicle** · May 03, 2020, 12:57 AM

Originally posted by Red Squirrel View Post

For example I would like .txt to open with a basic text editor, and .cpp, .h .php etc to open with kate. I don't care what's inside the file, I want it to go by the extension.

You should be able to do that with the File associations System Settings module (I tested it and it works on my end). Like jlittle mentioned setting the generic type seems to affect derivatives as well, so the trick seems to be to set the most generic first (set text/plain {.txt} to your "basic editor" [in the preferred applications list], and then set the more specific ones to open with kate (searching by the extension should show you the relevant mimetypes).

Originally posted by Red Squirrel View Post

I feel it's a messy way to go about it, extensions make more sense.

I don't agree with that, using mime types or magic numbers is generally better. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to set specific types to open in specific applications. Using just extensions might work well if you only ever work with files you yourself have created (and use your extensions religiously)..this does not apply to most users, even if it could apply to some.

**GreyGeek** · May 03, 2020, 11:13 AM

Originally posted by Red Squirrel View Post

....

Anyone know the name of the package for Libre Office? It's not libeoffice I tried. I will try to uninstall and reinstall to see if it fixes the issue.

Is that a typo? S/b libreoffice

**Red Squirrel** · May 03, 2020, 11:29 AM

Oh yeah typo here but I had it right when I did the command.

Code:

ryan@falcon:~$ sudo apt-get remove libreoffice
[sudo] password for ryan: 
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Package 'libreoffice' is not installed, so not removed
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 1 not upgraded.
ryan@falcon:~$

Oddly enough it seems to be remembering now... but not sure for how long. This is a new install and my printer was not setup yet so I did that, and printed something. I wonder if somehow that caused it to "apply" properly or something.

**Schwarzer Kater** · May 03, 2020, 01:44 PM

If you still want to remove LibreOffice you could give
sudo apt purge libreoffice-
a try, as apt search libreoffice | grep installed shows that most of the preinstalled LibreOffice packages begin with "libreoffice-" and "libreoffice" is not installed indeed (at least not on my computer).

You could also get rid of the invisible LibreOffice settings in your $HOME at first (I think they are in .config), if you don't want to remove the program (or parts of it) and try something different.

**Red Squirrel** · May 03, 2020, 05:17 PM

Looks like there is not a package for all of libreoffice but seems there's tons of small packages, so think I will leave it alone as it might cause more problems trying to delete/reinstall.

So far it's still remembering the association now.

I'm starting to wonder if it's something that only gets saved after a certain trigger, and maybe printing something caused it to trigger.

I'll give it more time and a couple more reboots and see if it sticks.

**oshunluvr** · May 04, 2020, 06:25 AM

Just FYI, if you're trying to purge a package using apt there's a couple of useful terminal functions you might want to know

dpkg -l | libre

would have listed all installed packages containing "libre" so you could review which packages you wanted to remove along with their names.

apt-cache search libreoffice

would list all packages available to install containing "libreoffice"

**Red Squirrel** · Jun 12, 2020, 09:08 AM

So this started happening again. It seems to be very specific to my work schedule for some reason. Other excel files seem to open fine but any time I get a new work schedule it refuses to open and I need to manually select calc each time, and I do check the box to remember but it still does not remember. verry annoying. I even tried to print, since that seemed to fix it last time, but that must have been a fluke.

Seems like lot of work to reinstall libreoffice, I don't like the idea of just blanket uninstalling and reinstalling everything with just a keyword. Is there not a way to actually uninstall and reinstall the suite as a whole without doing any manual leg work? In Windows I would just go in add/remove and do it from there.

**Red Squirrel** · Aug 25, 2020, 06:16 PM

I thought it stopped doing it but it just started again. It seems to always do it with my work schedule, it's a .xlsm file. Super annoying. How do I make the settings stick permanently? It completely goes away if I right click there's not even any suggestions of what to open with. I have to go through the whole ordeal to set it again.

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File associates don't seem to stick

[DESKTOP] File associates don't seem to stick

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