# I cannot browse my files from the IPFS app

**URL:** <https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316>\
**Category:** Help\
**Created:** [May 20, 2021, 12:06am UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316 "2021-05-20T00:06:26Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 7\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![anon47005736](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f6c823/32.png) [@anon47005736](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/u/anon47005736)\
**Post date:** [May 20, 2021, 12:06am UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316/1 "2021-05-20T00:06:26Z")

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![Screen Shot 2021-05-19 at 20.05.39](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/uploads/ipfs1/original/2X/c/c6e4a5c015c688ac07088684aa1cb21f4a32cb75.jpeg)  
I’ve tried restarting the node and app multiple times

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**Author:** ![anon47005736](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f6c823/32.png) [@anon47005736](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/u/anon47005736)\
**Post date:** [May 20, 2021, 5:16am UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316/2 "2021-05-20T05:16:16Z")

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I just removed my ipfs folders in `~/` and it worked again (But with all my files gone)

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**Author:** ![lidel](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/discuss.ipfs.tech/lidel/32/9853_2.png) [@lidel](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/u/lidel)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2021, 12:45pm UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316/3 "2021-05-25T12:45:01Z")

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Bit unfortunate that you did not keep a copy of `~/.ipfs` – there is a high chance we would be able to debug and recover your data.

Do you remember if you imported anything to your _Files_ via [_Import → From IPFS_](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/uploads/short-url/zzmZuP52OquPGhW7CqoSVcrxQGF.png)  
or did anything in command line that involved `ipfs files cp` ?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![anon47005736](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f6c823/32.png) [@anon47005736](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/u/anon47005736)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2021, 2:45pm UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316/4 "2021-05-25T14:45:41Z")

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Recovering my data wasn’t an issue since I still had a local copy of everything I added, and no, I didn’t import anything that way (Unless using the companion browser extension counts).

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**Author:** ![lidel](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/discuss.ipfs.tech/lidel/32/9853_2.png) [@lidel](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/u/lidel)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2021, 9:14pm UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316/5 "2021-05-25T21:14:09Z")

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Ack. If anyone is able to reproduce this, please fill issue in [GitHub - ipfs/ipfs-webui: A frontend for an IPFS node.](https://github.com/ipfs/ipfs-webui) and either attach “problematic” repo to bug report, or share it with me privately.

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**Author:** ![NewDark](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/discuss.ipfs.tech/newdark/32/6346_2.png) [@NewDark](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/u/NewDark)\
**Post date:** [April 24, 2022, 10:59pm UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316/6 "2022-04-24T22:59:55Z")

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I’m having this issue due to ipfs-js not sharing the same repo/config/etc. Uploading programmatically fundamentally uploads to a different location.  
 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/uploads/ipfs1/original/2X/b/bb2a49a1a4b583667e4d4042cdad437f8ecf0e78.png)

Additionally, running the ipfs desktop means that it places a lock on it and it can’t be shared with ipfs-js while it’s running. Is there any way to solve for this?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![lidel](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/discuss.ipfs.tech/lidel/32/9853_2.png) [@lidel](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/u/lidel)\
**Post date:** [April 27, 2022, 8:25pm UTC](https://discuss.ipfs.tech/t/i-cannot-browse-my-files-from-the-ipfs-app/11316/7 "2022-04-27T20:25:45Z")

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You can use [RPC API](https://docs.ipfs.io/reference/http/api/) to talk to an existing daemon. Usually, when folks want to run only one thing, they run ipfs-desktop/go-ipfs and talk to it from CLI or JS RPC Client:

- CLI: `ipfs --api /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/5001`
- programmatically in JS with [js-ipfs-http-client](https://www.npmjs.com/package/ipfs-http-client):

```javascript
import { create } from 'ipfs-http-client'
const client = create(new URL('http://127.0.0.1:5001'))
const { cid } = await client.add('Hello world!')

```