Change Default Compress Option in Nautilus to ZIP – How to

compressionfile-rollergnomenautilus

On the right click menu (in Nautilus, desktop, etc), there is a "compress" option. Is there any way to make "zip" the default format for this?

Best Answer

After some investigating, it appears that this is controlled by a gconf setting. To set zip as the default compression method, hit Alt+F2 to launch the 'Run Application' window. Type 'gconf-editor' in the box and hit the 'Run' button. This can be seen in the screenshot below.

Run Application Window

Once you hit the 'Run' button, a window like the one below will appear. This is the Configuration Editor.

Configuration Editor

The compression feature of nautilus really uses file-roller. To get to the file-roller settings, start by expanding the 'apps' folder.

Apps Folder

Next, find and expand the 'file-roller' folder.

file-roller folder

Expand the 'dialogs' folder.

dialogs folder

Select the 'batch-add' folder.

batch-add folder

You should now see an item with the name of 'default_extension' in the section on the right. You will want to click on the 'Value' field and change whatever was previously there to '.zip'.

default_extension = .zip

Now, if you close the configuration editor and open nautilus, .zip should be the default compression method.

.zip is default compression method in nautilus

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