Question

47

Gconf, Dconf, Gsettings and the relationship between them

rated 0 times [ 47] [ 0] / answers: 1 / hits: 29573 / 1 Year ago, sun, march 19, 2023, 7:45:26

I'm trying to understand how Gconf, Dconf and Gsettings works and what the relationship is between them.

All I know is:

Gconf - XML based database (backend system). The older one.

Dconf - BLOB based database (backend system). The newer one.

Gsettings - CLI tool to edit settings. Looks like it works only with Dconf (although I saw somewhere that it might work with Gconf).

I know that for Gconf there is a GUI - Gconf-editor, and for Dconf - Dconf-editor.

So:

Which backend system is more often used - Dconf or Gconf?

Gsettings works with both of them? And why doesn't it show all Dconf schemas?

Where does Dconf save its data?

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answered 1 Year ago eighethod · Accepted Answer

GConf is obsolete. It is the older GNOME 2.x configuration API and system, and has been replaced by DConf/GSettings in newer versions. However, some applications still use it.

GSettings is a GLib implementation of DConf, which stores its data in a binary database.

The gsettings command line tool is simply a tool to access or modify settings via the GSettings API, in the same way that the older gconftool command line tool is for GConf.