killall nautilus
My Mandriva system has a rather annoying habit of not starting all components of the Nautilus file manager up properly. Since the system is up and running 24/7, this is rarely an issue, but unwanted power failures outlasting the UPS‘ ability to keep katana up and running do occur more frequently than anticipated. Once the startup has completed, it is not uncommon to be confronted with a rather bare desktop, missing all items previously placed there.
The solution is rather simple, though care should be taken that only the Nautilus resources are affected. For this to work, launch a terminal session and su - to become the super user. You may use sudo on other systems, if you wish. Then, issue the killall command and specify nautilus, like so: killall nautilus.
killall sends a termination signal to all processes that match the name specified. The end result is pleasing to the eye and makes the desktop usable once again.
All desktop items restored without too much fuss…
