Can I have different desktop directories on different workspaces on Gnome?

Question

I am running Linux Mint with "Gnome Classic", I guess it's Gnome 2. I am currently using 3 workspaces, and I have nautilus handling my desktop.

The problem is that my desktop is overloaded with files. And I prefer not having to store them in directories, as that would make one more window to open before accessing the file, I already have too many open.

Can I change the "Desktop" directory for each workspace? Or maybe extend the desktop on the 3 workspaces, so that I can move each icon on the workspace I need?

Do I have to change desktop managers? Or let another file browser than nautilus do the job (how would I do that?) ?

Thanks. (and btw I'm new to using linux, if there's a better approach, please do say so)

EDIT: This is what env | grep XDG gave me (nothing about a desktop):

jad@jad-PC ~ $ env | grep XDG
XDG_SESSION_COOKIE=95dcb1ee36841dd22e3633040000000d-1337336042.360588-45732386
XDG_SESSION_PATH=/org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Session0
XDG_SEAT_PATH=/org/freedesktop/DisplayManager/Seat0
XDG_CONFIG_DIRS=/etc/xdg/xdg-gnome-classic:/etc/xdg
XDG_DATA_DIRS=/usr/share/gnome-classic:/usr/share/gnome:/usr/local/share/:/usr/share/
XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP=GNOME

I also tried env | grep Desktop, which gave me nothing.

Answer 1

I don't think there's a less hackish solution involving Nautilus than this one:

As far as I can see, Nautilus displays what XDG tells it your desktop is (see env | grep XDG; but let's assume it's ~/Desktop) and there seems to be now way to change this setting without restarting Nautilus.

You can (probably, untested) change what ~/Desktop on changing your workspace. What I have in mind is roughly the following, replacing the Desktop folder with a symlink:

• Create shortcuts for changing the workspaces, i.e. Ctrl+1 executes ~/bin/switch-to-workspace-one.sh,
• which would be a shell script you write, that:
  1. changes the symlink Desktop to, say, ~/Workspaces/One and
  2. calls wmctrl to make metacity (the window manager) change to workspace 1

(...analogous for 2 and 3).. I am completely uncertain whether this might have bad consequences by violating assumptions of other programs, since it's a fairly non-standard hack. (There would be more things to take care of, e.g. switching the symlink back to Workspace one on logout (or on boot)...)

But since GNOME2 has had its best days, it might be advisable to look for an alternative, unfortunately, I don't know if other desktop managers can do this. (I had hopes for XFCE, but it seems to be impossible.)

(XMonad has "topic spaces" but this only affects default directories spawned programs find themselves in etc, there are no icons at all.)