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9.3. Browsing GSettings Values for Desktop Applications

There are two tools you can use to view and edit GSettings values:
  • The dconf-editor GUI tool.
  • The gsettings command-line utility.

Note

You may not have dconf-editor installed on the system by default. To install it, run the following command:
# yum install dconf-editor
Both dconf-editor and the gsettings utility let you browse and change options for system and application preferences. You can even use them to change preferences that do not exist in the graphical user interface.
dconf-editor provides a GUI for the browsing and editing of settings. It presents the hierarchy of settings in a tree-view and also displays additional information about each setting, including the description, type and default value. gsettings can be used to display and set dconf values. It also includes Bash completion for commands and settings. gsettings can be used to automate configuration in shell scripts.
Note that both dconf-editor and the gsettings utility are intended to browse and modify the current user's GSettings database. This means that you should always run these tools as a normal user.
dconf-editor showing org.gnome.destop.background GSettings Keys

Figure 9.1. dconf-editor showing org.gnome.destop.background GSettings Keys

Getting More Information

For more information on the dconf-editor tool, see the dconf-editor(1) man page.
For more information on the gsettings utility, see the gsettings(1) man page.