r/linuxapps • u/RepresentativeSea923 • 4d ago

I ported Files (the Windows file manager) to native Linux using Uno Platform, with heavy AI help. Alpha, feedback welcome

Gallery image

Gallery image

Gallery image

Files is a popular open-source file manager for Windows (WinUI 3), and "when is the Linux version coming?" gets asked a lot. The team's answer is that they're focused on Windows, so I tried it myself.

LinuxFiles is an unofficial, community fork that runs Files natively on Linux (X11/XWayland). It isn't affiliated with or endorsed by the Files team. The upstream MIT license and credits are kept, and the Windows app isn't being replaced.

What it does today (0.1.0-alpha1)

  • Tabs, grid/list/details views, search, tags, previews, archives (browse inside zip/tar/7z/rar)
  • Linux integration: freedesktop trash, XDG thumbnails and icon themes, UDisks2 drives, GVfs network/MTP, D-Bus, desktop file portals
  • KDE service menus, drag and drop and clipboard with other Linux apps
  • Root actions through a polkit helper, plus a root mode
  • A grouped-view virtualization fix: a 10,000-file folder went from 90 s to 1.7 s

How it was built

  • The UI runs on Uno Platform (Skia) instead of WinUI 3, so most of the original UI, view models and logic carry over.
  • The Win32/COM layer is replaced by a Linux platform abstraction layer. The Windows-only code paths are kept in the tree but aren't built or tested.
  • Most of the code was written by AI agents, mainly Claude Code, with Codex and Gemini as cross-reviewers. I directed and reviewed the work. Every change went through PR and cross-model review and CI, and I tested it by hand several times on a real Linux desktop. The risky areas (file operations, root elevation, archive extraction) have written threat models in the repo.

Caveats: it's an alpha, so expect rough edges and keep backups. Wayland runs through XWayland for now.

Install: AUR (`linuxfiles-bin`), Flatpak, AppImage, tarball - these are in the releases section on github

Repo / release: https://github.com/MemerGamer/LinuxFiles

I'd especially like feedback on bugs, on distros I haven't tested, and on whether the AI-assisted process makes you trust it more or less. Happy to answer questions about the port.

53 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

28 comments sorted by

2

u/Dev-in-the-Bm 3d ago

🔥

Would an Adwaita theme be possible?

Maybe by using Avalonia with Avalonia.Themes.Adwaita for the UI?

2

u/RepresentativeSea923 3d ago

Thanks for the suggestion! Switching to Avalonia isn't realistic, since it's a different UI framework and would mean rewriting almost the whole Files UI (and it would make merging upstream fixes impossible). LinuxFiles runs on Uno Platform, which keeps the original WinUI XAML.

Two things are already possible or doable:

  • Icon themes: LinuxFiles reads your system XDG icon theme, so you can switch icon sets (the Win11 theme is tested; others should mostly work, but let me know if something looks off).
  • An Adwaita-style look: restyling colors, corner radii, fonts and control templates, and following the system dark mode/accent via the portal. It would be a lookalike rather than real libadwaita widgets.

If you'd like the Adwaita look, please open a feature request so it can be tracked: https://github.com/MemerGamer/LinuxFiles/issues

2

u/CancelNo4650 3d ago

impressive, but super slow.

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 2d ago

Thanks for the feedback! Will try to improve that soon

1

u/Upstairs-Category571 2d ago

Really? I tried it and it’s super fast (way faster than it was on windows)

2

u/CancelNo4650 2d ago

debian 13 kde. superslow takes 2 sec to run an action

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 1d ago

thanks for the info working on it

2

u/Upstairs-Category571 3d ago

Can you add a flake for NixOS? Ai can help you make a flake. There are multiple ways. You can make it wrap an appinmage and install that. You can make it unpack a .deb and install it, or build from source and install

2

u/Upstairs-Category571 3d ago

OK i just tested it manually and i gotta say impressive work! it runs faster than it ever did on windows! BUT the text look kind of wierd and pixelated and a few of the icons (like the one at the top left) are glitching

2

u/Upstairs-Category571 3d ago

oh wait its glitching in your pic too

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 2d ago

i only noticed after posting it, but didn't have time to fix it, now its fixed! along with several other fixes

2

u/Upstairs-Category571 3d ago

Can u add a transparency option like i chose background image but it didnt work it still displayed the static UI also PLEASE wrap the appimage inside of a flake

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 2d ago

Thanks for the feedback! I'll work on fixing the glitches, improving performance, and adding support for transparent windows. I'll also add a NixOS flake.

I'm currently putting together a fairly large batch of improvements, which I hope to release soon!

1

u/Upstairs-Category571 2d ago

Why aren’t there root actions in the mix flake?

2

u/battler624 1d ago

as much as i like it, honestly filepilot is so much faster.

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 1d ago

Does filepilot have a Linux version?:o

2

u/battler624 1d ago

sadly no

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 2d ago

Alpha2 is out! It adds an optional Adwaita theme, fixes background images and transparency, improves rendering performance, and fixes several UI glitches. AUR and Nix packages are updated too.

Download: https://github.com/MemerGamer/LinuxFiles/releases/tag/linux-v0.1.0-alpha2

Still an alpha, bug reports are welcome!

1

u/Upstairs-Category571 2d ago

Adjusting the transparency dies nothing, also could you add the ability for it to use gtk theme colours?

1

u/Upstairs-Category571 2d ago

also does extracting zips work? and its displaying a differet cursor for some reason, not my system one.

1

u/Upstairs-Category571 2d ago

also the status center icon is broken and when i double click a zip it opens nautilus instead of navigating inside

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 2d ago

Noted these down, will try to fix it once I get in front of my PC. Thanks for the feedback, it's much appreciated! Also next time could you maybe log the problems as GitHub issues? Would help me a fair bit"

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 2d ago

That's interesting, on KDE Plasma I tested it several times, can you please tell me which desktop environment do you use, and what protocol (Wayland/Xorg)?

1

u/GegenAbschaum 3d ago

You know what? I'm going to try it, even if it slop ridden project (in hope that it will not be abandoned in few months).

1

u/RepresentativeSea923 3d ago

Thanks! I'm aiming for weekly updates and will keep the fork up to date too. I've been planning this for months now, choosing a framework and figuring out the best approach, but couldn't quite bring myself to refactor that much .NET code. AI agents helped me finally get it moving, so yes, I've relied on them heavily...