Eventual symlinks under `$HOME/.config/xfce4/xfconf` are substituted with regular files. E.g.: f=$HOME/.config/xfce4/xfconf/xfce-perchannel-xml/xfce4-panel.xml mv $f ~ && ln -s $HOME/xfce4-panel.xml $f After a logout and login cycle, the `xfce4-panel.xml` symlink has been re-converted into a file. I have seen that happens to other settings as well (e.g. to `xfwm4.xml`) so I *think* this behavior is shared across the whole XFCE4 ecosystem. Looking around I found bug #10443 that I think exhibits the same issue but on a different context. Rationale: I am sharing part of my environment across different distro by using [homeshick](https://github.com/andsens/homeshick), so directly symlinking XML files (the ones that I want to share) would be really convenient.
I believe this is fixed in bug #14698 with https://git.xfce.org/xfce/libxfce4util/commit?id=5b23e5190b0ac90793344d720044711413743c2d
I don't know it is resolved but it surely is the same bug. Closing as duplicate. *** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 14698 ***