Changing Tor Browser default download folder to /home/user/Downloads

Development
1

Seeing the confusion caused by the Tor Browser default download directory… ( https://forums.whonix.org/t/whonix-workstation-how-shown-in-the-downloaded-files-internet )

I was wondering if tb-updater should apply an optional (fail open) patch. Using a preferences file to set the download folder by default to /home/user/Downloads. By fail open patch I mean, should tb-updater not able to copy that file into place, it would just echo and ignore this issue. One would think this is not so hard, but…

pref("browser.download.dir", "/home/user/Downloads"); alone is not enough. Complete file for pre-configuration:

/home/user/.tb/tor-browser/Browser/TorBrowser/Data/Browser/profile.default/preferences/30_download_folder.js

pref("browser.download.dir", "/home/user/Downloads");
pref("browser.download.folderList", 2);
pref("browser.download.importedFromSqlite", true);
pref("browser.download.useDownloadDir", true)

Without the browser.download.importedFromSqlite pref it didn’t work. And I couldn’t figure out in reasonable time what browser.download.importedFromSqlite is doing. So maybe better to leave the default download folder as bad as is.

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Yes, this is a usability issue

proposed solutions:

  • create a symlink from
    /home/user/.tb/tor-browser/Browser/Downloads/ to /home/user/Downloads/ (would this survive a Tor Browser reinstall when using the update-torbrowser command or the GUI ‘Tor Browser Downloader (AnonDist)’ app?)
  • or, add a desktop entry (or symlink) to the user’s /home/user/Downloads/ folder which points to the Tor Browser Downloads folder

/home/user/Downloads/Tor Browser Downloads.desktop:

[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Type=Link
Name=Tor Browser Downloads
Comment=
Icon=folder-download
URL=/home/user/.tb/tor-browser/Browser/Downloads

edit: or perhaps more elegantly, using a symlink directly in the user’s home /home/user/ folder like so:
/home/user/Downloads (Tor Browser)
that would be sorted alphabetically directly under the regular Downloads folder

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  • A .desktop file in folder /usr/share/applications (and file name without spaces) and;
  • a symlink from /home/user/Downloads_Tor_Browser to /home/user/.tb/tor-browser/Browser/Downloads/

are very good ideas!

Touching the inside the the /home/user/.tb/tor-browser folder might break Tor Browser Internal Updater because it manages the whole folder (binary + settings + user data).

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4

What about creating a custom user.js file:

// Set the default download directory
user_pref("browser.download.dir", "/home/user/Downloads");
user_pref("browser.download.folderList", 2); // Use the specified directory

Btw I wish also that downloads where saved to /home/user/Downloads/ instead of the .tb downloads directory.

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Quote:

Whonix does not:

  • Apply file system level changes to the Tor Browser folder. In other words, there are no modifications of any files inside Tor Browser’s data folder. Files such as startup script, default settings and so on are untouched.

[…]

Changes are kept minimal and for integration purposes only. This is a deliberate design decision. […]

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