Use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+D to open the drive menu and select your USB drive.
Use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+D to open the drive menu and select your USB drive.
Yes, you can set up a shortcut for a mounted disk on your desktop in Ubuntu 21.10. Just drag the mount point to your desktop and assign it as a shortcut.
You seem to be attempting to launch File Explorer at the drive location, but your request is a bit unclear. Could you clarify what you're trying to achieve?
Open terminal and paste the Nautilus.desktop file onto your desktop: cp /usr/share/applications/org.gnome.Nautilus.desktop ~/Desktop/CustomNautilus.desktop. You’ll notice it appears now. Click right-click, choose "Properties," then ensure the Execute option is checked. Click again and pick "Allow Launching." Now you have a working desktop shortcut. Right-click once more and select "Open With Other Application" to set your preferred editor. The adjustments I made affected lines 2, 6, and 8. On line 2 I renamed the shortcut to "Download." On line 8 I switched the icon type to folder. In line 6 I included the desired directory for opening Nautilus. This is the path you’ll use when mounting your drive. If you want to explore other icons, look in /usr/share/icons/Yaru/32x32/—there are many options available.
Thanks for the insight. It would be nice if Ubuntu highlighted only mounted USB drives in the sidebar. Currently it toggles on and off. I reset the settings to enable showing mounts and turned them off again. Remember to save your changes to "CustomNautilus.desktop" under a different name in the desktop folder so you can manage multiple files.
For users on 22.04 or later, right-click an empty area of the desktop, choose Desktop Icon Settings, then look for Dock Behavior settings. Adjust them as needed.
I updated my notes on July 16, 2022 after discovering a method that works for my requirements.