pcmanfm - File Manager - Can't right-click Paste into the home directory or an immediate subdirectory when in ListView mode

[qrp73]

The "Paste" option is unavailable after single click on "Copy" menu, requiring the user to click "Copy" menu at least twice in order to use "Paste" menu.

Steps to Reproduce:

1. Open File Manager (pcmanfm).
2. Right-click on a file and select "Copy" from the context menu.
3. Double-click on another folder to change the current directory.
4. Right-click in the new folder and attempt to select "Paste" from the context menu.

Expected Result: The "Paste" option should be available and should paste the previously copied file into the new folder.

Actual Result: The "Paste" option is unavailable. The user is forced to select "Copy" at least twice before being able to paste the file.

Impact: This issue has been present for a long time and is highly disruptive to workflow, requiring unnecessary repetition of actions to complete a basic task. It greatly affects usability and efficiency in file management.

Recommendation: Fix the issue so that the "Paste" become accessible after single select "Copy" menu, without requiring the user to re-select "Copy" again.

[lurch]

I'm not able to reproduce this - it all works perfectly fine for me. Can you please provide more details about which OS image / desktop environment / Raspberry Pi / etc. you're using?

[qrp73]

Raspberry Pi 4B rev 1.5

$ uname -a && cat /etc/rpi-issue && vcgencmd version
Linux raspi 6.6.51+rpt-rpi-v8 #1 SMP PREEMPT Debian 1:6.6.51-1+rpt3 (2024-10-08) aarch64 GNU/Linux
Raspberry Pi reference 2023-09-22
Generated using pi-gen, https://github.com/RPi-Distro/pi-gen, 40f37458ae7cadea1aec913ae10b5e7008ebce0a, stage4
Aug 30 2024 19:17:39 
Copyright (c) 2012 Broadcom
version 2808975b80149bbfe86844655fe45c7de66fc078 (clean) (release) (start)

As I remember this issue was present just out of the box after all Raspberry Pi OS installation.
Currently I also installed clipman, but this issue was present before installation.

This is very strange that you cannot reproduce it. Do you use context menu by right click mouse?

Maybe it is related to pcmanfm settings? I'm using Detailed List View, and disabled Layout->Display simplified user interface and menus

[lurch]

I'm using Detailed List View

Ah! That seems to be the problem. If I click on the "View as detailed list" button on the toolbar, then the right-click "Paste" menu indeed appears to stop working. Although the Edit->Paste menu does still seem to work, so I guess that's a workaround for now whilst we investigate this problem...

[popcornmix]

Just tried and a copied a file and pasted it into a new directory just fine. This was using right-click menu options.
This was on a Pi5 with labwc enabled.

[lurch]

Ah-ha! After a bit more head-scratching, myself and @popcornmix have managed to figure out why it works sometimes but not others. 💡

If you've switched pcmanfm into List-view, and you're trying to right-click-Paste into your home directory or an immediate subdirectory of your home directory, then the Paste silently fails. But if you try and Paste into a sub-sub-directory (which is what @popcornmix was trying), then the Paste succeeds! How bizarre.

Detailed reproduction steps:

1. Launch pcmanfm (File Manager) and create a new directory in your home folder e.g. SubDir
2. Navigate into SubDir and create another directory inside there e.g. SubSubDir (i.e. so the full path is something like /home/pi/SubDir/SubSubDir)
3. Navigate back to your home directory
4. Create two new empty files e.g. File1 and File2
5. Make sure that pcmanfm is in "Icon View" mode
6. Right-click on File1, select Copy
7. Navigate to SubDir
8. Right-click and select Paste - this works and creates File1
9. Navigate back to your home directory
10. Right-click on File2, select Copy
11. Navigate to SubSubDir
12. Right-click and select Paste - this works and creates File2
13. Now delete SubDir/File1 and SubDir/SubSubDir/File2
14. Navigate back to your home directory
15. Switch pcmanfm to "List View" mode
16. Right-click on File1, select Copy
17. Navigate to SubDir
18. Right-click and select Paste - this silently fails
19. Navigate back to your home directory
20. Right-click on File2, select Copy
21. Navigate to SubSubDir
22. Right-click and select Paste - this works and creates File2

[qrp73]

it doesn't depends on sub folder structure at all.

The Paste operation just don't works if you do Copy operation once.
If you do Copy operation twice for the same file, the Paste operation works.

You can reproduce it in the same folder: just right-click on the file and select Copy, then right-click on an empty space and verify that Paste is disabled. Then copy the same file a second time, and you will see that Paste is enabled.

The same issue happens if you use Cut instead of Copy.

It is very annoying when you copy a file, then change the current folder to find another location, and when you right-click to paste, you realize that the paste operation is disabled. You then have to find the original file again to copy it a second time.

Just tried to reproduce it with Icon View, and the issue is still present.

Interestingly, if you copy a file once, then restart pcmanfm and copy the same file a second time, the Paste option becomes available. This means the state is somehow remembered between pcmanfm sessions.

Also, there is need to restart pcmanfm after setting changes.

[qrp73]

Tested on old Bullseye image, it don't have such issue. So it appears in Raspi OS Bookworm.

[qrp73]

Tested it on a clean raspios install. And found additional details on how to reproduce it.

In order to reproduce this issue, you need to install clipman: sudo apt install clipman and add it to wayfire or labwc config.

For wayfire nano ~/.config/wayfire.ini:

[autostart]
clipman-restore = clipman restore
clipman-store = wl-paste -t text --watch clipman store

For labwc mkdir -p ~/.config/labwc && nano ~/.config/labwc/autostart:

/usr/bin/wl-paste -t text --watch clipman store &

After that reboot the system and you will be able to reproduce the issue with non working Paste operation in pcmanfm for the single copy operation.