QtFM

A lightweight file manager for Linux, built with Python and PySide6 as a university project to demonstrate data structures and algorithms in a practical context.

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Features

Navigation

• Browse the filesystem with a tree view or icon grid view
• Breadcrumb bar
• Back, forward, and parent folder navigation
• Direct path editing by double-clicking the breadcrumb bar
• Sidebar with quick access to common folders and trash

File Operations

• Create files and folders
• Rename, cut, copy, and paste (with conflict resolution)
• Move to trash and restore using the FreeDesktop Trash spec
• Permanently delete files and folders
• Multiple selection
• Open folders in a new window
• Open terminal in directory

Search

• Search in current folder or across the entire filesystem
• Choose between BFS (breadth-first) and DFS (depth-first) traversal
• Double-click a result to navigate to its containing folder

Compression

• Compress text files using Huffman encoding implementation
• Decompress .huff files back to their original content

View & Sort

• Toggle between grid and tree views
• Sort by name, size, or date in ascending or descending order
• Show or hide hidden files and directories
• Zoom in, out, and reset icon size in grid view

Properties

• File and folder properties dialog with general info and permissions
• Directory size computation

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Data Structures & Algorithms

This project was built as a university assignment and intentionally demonstrates several data structures and algorithms:

Concept	Where used
Singly linked list	Breadcrumb path representation
Binary tree	Huffman encoding/decoding tree
Stack	DFS file search, back/forward navigation history
Queue	BFS file search
Min-heap	Huffman tree construction via heapq
Frequency table	Character frequency counting for Huffman
Thread + queue	Background search worker with result streaming

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Dependencies

PySide6
send2trash
bitarray

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Running

git clone https://github.com/Lucifer25x/qtfm.git
cd qtfm

If using pip:

pip install PySide6 send2trash bitarray
python main.py

Or using uv:

uv sync
uv run main.py

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Project Structure

qtfm/
├── main.py
└── app/
    ├── file_manager.py       # Main window
    ├── core/
    │   ├── model.py          # QFileSystemModel with icon provider
    │   ├── path_logic.py     # PathLinkedList for breadcrumbs
    │   └── trash.py          # FreeDesktop Trash spec implementation
    ├── ui/
    │   ├── actions.py        # Central QAction registry
    │   ├── context_menu.py   # Context menu builder
    │   ├── dialogs.py        # Properties dialog
    │   ├── menubar.py        # Application menubar
    │   ├── sidebar.py        # Sidebar widget
    │   ├── toolbar.py        # Toolbar with breadcrumbs and search bar
    │   └── views.py          # File views (tree, grid, search results)
    ├── algorithms/
    │   ├── huffman.py        # Huffman encode/decode implementation
    │   ├── search.py         # BFS and DFS search generators
    │   └── search_worker.py  # Background search thread with queue
    └── utils/
        ├── file_ops.py       # File operations (create, rename, copy, cut, paste)
        └── icon_provider.py  # Custom file icon provider with fallbacks

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Platform

Targets Linux. Not designed to be cross-platform, though minor changes to path logic and trash handling would make it work on Windows.

Tested on:

• OS: CachyOS Linux (Arch-based)
• Kernel: 6.9.0-1 (CachyOS)
• Desktop: KDE Plasma
• Python: 3.14.5
• PySide6: 6.9.1
• Qt: 6.9.1