Files and privacy

Privacy

Glimt sends nothing anywhere: no telemetry, no update checks, no network library in it. It reads the folders you open and writes only the files listed below. The network is used only when you ask: a share you open (through GVfs), and the browser for a photo's place on OpenStreetMap or for Get More Themes. The desktop is asked for its dark style, accent colour and screen profile over D-Bus.

Plugins and decoder plugins are programs on your computer, which Glimt starts with the files you chose; Glimt sends their files nowhere. Remote commands reach only your own Glimt windows on this computer, through a private socket; Glimt opens no network port.

Files

What	Where
Preferences	~/.config/glimt/config
Keyword tree	~/.config/glimt/keywords, a path such as Places|Norway|Oslo on each line
Own themes	~/.config/glimt/themes/*.theme
Sort manager folders	~/.config/glimt/sort-folders
Last folder (when enabled)	~/.local/state/glimt/state
Marks and stars	~/.local/state/glimt/marks
A Rename Many while it runs, to put right after a crash	~/.local/state/glimt/renames/
Collections	~/.local/share/glimt/collections, as .gqv files; plain lists (.txt, .m3u) anywhere are read, never written
Plugins of your own	~/.local/share/glimt/plugins/*.desktop
Decoder plugins	~/.local/share/glimt/decoders/*.desktop
Keywords, comment, alt text and extended description, and stars when chosen	photo.jpg.xmp beside the image
Remote-control sockets, only your user can reach them	$XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/glimt
Thumbnails	~/.cache/thumbnails, shared with other programs

The folders follow XDG_CONFIG_HOME, XDG_STATE_HOME, XDG_DATA_HOME, XDG_CACHE_HOME and XDG_RUNTIME_DIR when they are set. Glimt's own files are plain text, written to a temporary file and renamed, so a crash never leaves half of one. Several Glimt windows share them: settings, collections, marks and the keyword tree keep what another window wrote meanwhile. A sidecar is written whole, and windows changing the same photo's keywords or stars wait for each other; only a Flatpak Glimt and a package Glimt changing it at the same moment can lose one change.

Backup

Your marks, stars, collections and keyword tree are in these files, not in the photos: back them up with your photos. File → Back Up Glimt's Data… (Glimt 0.26.0 or newer) copies the config, state and data folders, without the thumbnails, which are made again, to a new folder glimt-backup-DATE wherever you choose. glimt --back-up FOLDER (Glimt 0.31.0 or newer) does the same without a window, from cron or a systemd timer. They are plain text, which any program can read. To restore, close Glimt and copy them back:

cp -r glimt-backup-2026-10-16/config/. ~/.config/glimt/
cp -r glimt-backup-2026-10-16/state/.  ~/.local/state/glimt/
cp -r glimt-backup-2026-10-16/data/.   ~/.local/share/glimt/

Keywords, comments and alt text are in the XMP sidecars beside the photos, so a backup of the photo folders takes them along. Glimt keeps no database of its own: a Lightroom catalog is Lightroom's, which Glimt only reads.

License

Glimt is free software under the MIT license. The source is on GitHub.