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Is it safe to delete every hidden folder in the home directory?

rated 0 times [ 10] [ 0] / answers: 1 / hits: 9114 / 2 Years ago, mon, february 21, 2022, 3:46:40

My $HOME (otherwise known as '~') directory has lots of hidden configuration folders.

Is it safe to delete all of them?

To be specific

Will the OS break if I do so?

Will my ethernet/printer/sound/graphics drivers stop working?

I don't care about superficial things like: Gnome themes, Key shortcuts, Font settings, etc

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mance

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3 Years ago

answered 2 Years ago armis · Accepted Answer

You should be relatively safe:

Surely your OS won't break, dot files in home directory are mostly configuration files, if they're not there any app will just use the defaults.

Device drivers (as ethernet,video,sound,...) should be configured systemwide, so you should be safe.

Those are the things will "break" as all your preferences/customizations will get lost, but you don't care ;)

In fact if you add another user to the system his home directory will be mostly empty, apart from some default files which are put inside by default. But those defaults are distro-specific and surely not mandatory.

So yes, you should be quite safe deleting everything under home.

Just in case, play safe and move them to another directory and check everything is ok before deleting them.