Getting Dolphin Flatpak to function as if it were installed in Plasma

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Getting Dolphin Flatpak to function as if it were installed in Plasma

I was just wondering if it was possible to be able to get the Dolphin Flatpak to function as if it were installed in Plasma itself.
I tried using the application “Flatseal” to allow permissions but have not really been successful, noticed couple things not working.
I basically tried turning on all permissions, not sure if anything else can be done, I can see there are some options to select specific paths for certain items but do not know enough about those parameters to test them out.

A few things I noticed were….
1.) Some context menu items missing
2.) No “open” / “open with” ability to set default programs (I am aware that if a program is opened three times then Dolphins applies this but would rather be able to set manually)
3.) Search tool does not generate any results

I am sure Flatpak has limitations, but was really hoping for a seamless, full integration feel to Dolphin Flatpak if possible.
I am really looking to be able to access new features that the new versions make available.
Also was hoping to share quite a few feature requests to be added to the program.
Unfortunately in Linux, even if developers actually decide to add features you request (which is rare as it is), by the time they are coded and then added to the program, still have to wait a couple years on top of that to actually be able to enjoy them.
So two options, wait three or four years for new features, or use a Flatpak and maybe get newer features slightly earlier (but they don’t seem to work well with file managers unfortunately, again unless I am overlooking something?)

If Flatpak versions do not work well, would be great to see Dolphin offered in a standalone / portable version as some Linux programs come in. Don’t imagine that would be a route that KDE / Dolphin would want to take, also don’t know how many users would want something like this.

Anyways, if anyone has any information please share
Thank You

Also can someone tell me if there is a website that shows the changes made to each version of Dolphin.
I see there are lists of the Dolphin version numbers as well as the dates they come out but have been able to find an actual list of changes / fixes made in each new version.
Thanks again

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Dolphin didn’t get that much love in regards to Flatpak yet. An example of this is that we only very recently managed to allow copying from Dolphin to sandboxed(/flatpaked) applications without causing other major issues (AFAIK). For Dolphin 22.12 and 22.08 I had to revert that functionality (Revert "portalize drag urls" (c8aed8ac) · Commits · System / Dolphin · GitLab) because it caused huge problems.

Seeing that something this basic only works since somewhat recently, one unfortunately can’t expect all the more advanced functionalities to work flawlessly.

I am sure Flatpak has limitations, but was really hoping for a seamless, full integration feel to Dolphin Flatpak if possible.

Especially considering that Dolphin has so much integration with other parts of the system, there is more work to be done here. An application that doesn’t need to interact much with the outside world would have less issues being suddenly sandboxed/flatpaked.

A few things I noticed were….
1.) Some context menu items missing
2.) No “open” / “open with” ability to set default programs (I am aware that if a program is opened three times then Dolphins applies this but would rather be able to set manually)
3.) Search tool does not generate any results

I haven’t looked into these issues specifically, so I unfortunately can not tell what the status of those issues is or if they might be fixable by some configuration on your end or something.

Unfortunately in Linux, even if developers actually decide to add features you request (which is rare as it is), by the time they are coded and then added to the program, still have to wait a couple years on top of that to actually be able to enjoy them.

That fully depends on your distribution. There are even distributions that allow you to run Dolphin versions that haven’t even been released yet. In those cases you get every new feature and all the bugs in real time. ^^ That’s even faster than our Flatpak releases. :hushed:

If Flatpak versions do not work well

I am currently not aware of any fundamental issue with Flatpak that would conceptually stop Dolphin from working similarly well as a Flatpak as a traditionally packaged version, but there might be a lot of work necessary to get there. We are always lacking contributors, and a lot of focus goes towards the majority of users who are currently using Dolphin as a traditionally installed package.

Also can someone tell me if there is a website that shows the changes made to each version of Dolphin.
I see there are lists of the Dolphin version numbers as well as the dates they come out but have been able to find an actual list of changes / fixes made in each new version.

Dolphin is released as part of KDE Gear, so the KDE Gear announcements like KDE Gear 22.04 - KDE Community will mention any major new features of Dolphin. Aside from Nate (https://pointieststick.com/), we don’t really have anyone who summarises new features of Dolphin as they come (and Nate can’t mention everything either). So for any more in-depth information about changes you would need to actually check which commits made it into a Dolphin version. But this is information for developers, so it isn’t edited so everyone could understand it or anything.

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@felixernst
Hey Felix, just wanted thank you very much for taking the time to answer each of my questions with such a detailed response, I really appreciate it.
Although not the best of news this was actually very helpful, I am finding that in Linux getting an answer that closes up a possiblity is almost just as valuable as getting a solution. This will allow me to focus on other possibilities.
I agree better to focus more on the real version rather than the Flatpak version.
I use Dolphin in Plasma currently (although an older version due to the nature of Linux) and have used a newer Flatpak version just to test any new features available, very impressive program, you guys are doing some great work, thank you.
Although I probably won’t be able to enjoy any of them for a while, I have many many ideas, (more than I know what to do with) not all of them are good but I imagine some of them have to be. If you guys are interested if I get some time maybe I will share a few.
Thanks again for your response and the work that you do.

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You are welcome, and thanks for the praise!

You are also welcome to share any ideas you have, but I have to dampen expectations because we will always have more users with ideas than contributors working on implementing those ideas. I would go crazy if I tried to fix/improve every issue that I am currently aware of, but I wouldn’t want to discourage discussions on such topics either. I am kind of hoping we get more contributors through this new forum.

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flatpak override --user --env=QT_QPA_PLATFORM=wayland org.kde.dolphin
(org.kde.dolphin) in my case

Worked for me