You could probably extend the timeout in your system. Open the gconf-editor using sudo gconf-editor and navigate to desktop -> gnome -> session. There you find a key idle_delay. You can change that value by double-clicking on it. Depending from how long you are typically inactive you change it. So if you usually don't have FTP activity for half an hour set it to a value larger than 30.

There is also an entry in Ubuntus bug tracker and in GNOME bug tracker. GNOME seems to work on a fix.

Edit Symbolic Link in Nautilus

The script

To do this in Nautilus we need to create a script using:

mkdir -p ~/.local/share/nautilus/scripts
gedit ~/.local/share/nautilus/scripts/edit-link

Paste in the following:

#!/bin/bash

# NAME: edit-link
# PATH: $HOME/.local/share/nautilus/scripts
# DESC: Edit symbolic link
# CALL: Called from Nautilus file manager.
# DATE: August 18, 2018.

# strip new line char passed by Nautilus
FILENAME=$(echo $NAUTILUS_SCRIPT_SELECTED_FILE_PATHS | sed -e 's/\r//g')

# Multiple files can't be selected.
LINE_COUNT=$(wc -l <<< "$NAUTILUS_SCRIPT_SELECTED_FILE_PATHS")
LINE_COUNT=$((LINE_COUNT-1))

if [[ $LINE_COUNT > 1 ]] ; then
    zenity --error --text "Ony one file can be selected at a time! "
    exit 1
fi

# Object type must be "file..." (ie no directories, etc.)
if [ -d "${FILENAME}" ] ; then
    zenity --error --text "$FILENAME is a directory!";
    exit 1
else
    if [ -L "${FILENAME}" ]; then
        : # Bash noop
    else
        zenity --error --text "${FILENAME} is not a symbolic link!";
        exit 2
    fi
fi

NewLink=$(zenity --entry --text "Enter new symbolic link")
ln -sf "$NewLink" "${FILENAME}"

exit 0

and make it executable

chmod +x ~/.local/share/nautilus/scripts/edit-link

Sample output

This is the test data used. The second last section shows the broken link. Then our script is run giving a new file name. The last section shows the new good link.

Sample screen

This is what the script looks like when you run it:

• Highlight a broken link with Nautilus
• Right click for context menu
• Select Scripts
• Select edit-link
• Enter new file name above and click OK button

Edit Symbolic Link in Caja

The method is similar to Nautilus but with some Caja specifics. We should follow GNOME2→MATE Migration guide.

So we need create script in the ~/.config/caja/scripts:

mkdir -p ~/.config/caja/scripts
cat > ~/.config/caja/scripts/edit-link << \EOF
#!/bin/bash

# NAME: edit-link
# PATH: $HOME/.config/caja/scripts
# DESC: Edit symbolic link
# CALL: Called from Caja file manager.
# DATE: August 19, 2018.

# strip new line char passed by Caja
FILENAME=$(echo $CAJA_SCRIPT_SELECTED_FILE_PATHS | sed -e 's/\r//g')

# Multiple files can't be selected.
LINE_COUNT=$(wc -l <<< "$CAJA_SCRIPT_SELECTED_FILE_PATHS")
LINE_COUNT=$((LINE_COUNT-1))

if [[ $LINE_COUNT > 1 ]] ; then
    zenity --error --text "Ony one file can be selected at a time! "
    exit 1
fi

# Object type must be "file..." (ie no directories, etc.)
if [ -d "${FILENAME}" ] ; then
    zenity --error --text "$FILENAME is a directory!";
    exit 1
else
    if [ -L "${FILENAME}" ]; then
        : # Bash noop
    else
        zenity --error --text "${FILENAME} is not a symbolic link!";
        exit 2
    fi
fi

NewLink=$(zenity --entry --text "Enter new symbolic link")
ln -sf "$NewLink" "${FILENAME}"

exit 0
EOF

and make it executable

chmod +x ~/.config/caja/scripts/edit-link

Then we can use this script from Caja Scripts drop-down menu.