App how long to keep something in the clipboard?

rado84 · 2019-10-30 12:26:06

At the moment, when I copy something, it remains in the clipboard for no more than 5 minutes which is very annoying. And if I copy content from a temporarily opened file from an archive, the content remains in the clipboard only if the file and the archive remain open. If I close either one or both, the copied content disappears immediately from the clipboard.
Is there any app where you can specify the duration of how long that something will remain there? I wanna make that duraiton indefinite or until I copy something else - just like the Windows clipboard works. So far I tried gpaste and clipit but none of them have a "duration" option.

The DE is Cinnamon - GNOME based which means GNOME/GTK apps will work 100%.

Trilby · 2019-10-30 12:43:37

There is no duration parameter. I'm not sure what your initial problem of things not lasting beyond 5 minutes is, but it has nothing to do with a selection timing out - it's just that either the owner released the selection or something else claimed the selection.

The second symptom, of the selection contents not persisting when the source application is closed, is the default X11 behavior. The clipboard data is not stored anywhere in the x server, only an id of the clipboard selection owner is stored, and it is up to that owner application to maintain the data. When that application closes, the data is gone.

This second problem is precisely what the clipboard managers were designed to extend.

rado84 · 2019-10-30 13:32:03

I understand, Trilby and thanks for the link. For now the one I liked the most is Parcellite.
One question though - you say that the clipboard forgetting the content is default X11 behavior. If that's the case, isn't it possible that this behavior is changed somewhere (for instance - in a config file)?

seth · 2019-10-30 14:14:07

s/default/bare/

The protocol is that a client tells the server "hey, if anyone want's the clipboard content, ask me!" and if another client asks the server "where to ask for the clipboard" the server just say "ask that guy." That's not configurable and designed to keep the server communication payload low (because X11 is a network protocol with a display server attached)
This is where clipboard managers step in to provide the behavior known from local desktop systems (windows)

Trilby · 2019-10-30 14:41:46

rado84 wrote:

you say that the clipboard forgetting the content is default X11 behavior

No, I didn't say that. There is nothing to "forget". The content is never stored on the server. It is only stored in the client program ("application") in which you selected/copied the data. But for this problem, a clipboard manager is the solution as it steps in to solve this concern: the clipboard manager continues to run in the background and maintains the last content that was copied into the clipboard even after the program that copied it to the clipboard is closed.

The 5 minute problem is something entirely different. That is unintended behavior, but we'd need more information to help with that. Most likely, there is some process that is periodically claiming the clipboard selection but has nothing to put in it.

Arch Linux

#1 2019-10-30 12:26:06

App how long to keep something in the clipboard?

#2 2019-10-30 12:43:37

Re: App how long to keep something in the clipboard?

#3 2019-10-30 13:32:03

Re: App how long to keep something in the clipboard?

#4 2019-10-30 14:14:07

Re: App how long to keep something in the clipboard?

#5 2019-10-30 14:41:46

Re: App how long to keep something in the clipboard?

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