Ubuntu / Unity attach script to Launcher

Question

I recently downloaded IntelliJ IDEA and start the app by running . idea.sh. The app appears in the launcher while I'm running it, but for some reason when I right click on it I don't get a 'Lock to Launcher' option like I do with other apps.

How do I attach it to the launcher?

Is it because I'm running a script and not an executable directly that disables that option?

Answer 1

There looks to be 2 ways you can do this.

Method #1: manually create .desktop file

Yes you need to create a custom .desktop launcher for it. Here are the general steps:

1. Create *.desktop file in /usr/local/share/applications (or /usr/share/applications depending upon your system).

   $ gksudo gedit <insert-path-to-new-file.desktop>
   

2. Paste below text

   [Desktop Entry]
   Type=Application
   Terminal=false
   Name=IntelliJ IDEA
   Icon=/path/to/icon/icon.svg
   Exec=/path/to/file/idea.sh
   

   Edit Icon= and Exec= and Name=. Also Terminal=True/false determines weather the terminal opens a window and displays output or runs in the background.

3. Put the .desktop file into the Unity Launcher panel. For this step you'll need to navigate in a file browser to where the .desktop file is that you created in the previous steps. After locating the file, drag the file to the Unity Launcher bar on the side. After making doing this you may need to run the following command to get your system to recognize the newly added .desktop file.

   $ sudo update-desktop-database
   

Method #2: GUI method

Instead of manually creating the .desktop file you can summon a GUI to help assist in doing this.

1. install gnome-panel

   $ sudo apt-get install --no-install-recommends gnome-panel
   

2. launch the .desktop GUI generator

   $ gnome-desktop-item-edit ~/Desktop/ --create-new
   

                      

References

• How to add a shell script to launcher as shortcut

Answer 2

The following is usable in my case, launching a shell script from a launcher, and keeps the shell window open.

Method

• This example is with mate-terminal, use gnome-terminal if it's the one on your system.
• This example is with a php cli shell script, to get the idea, any command can be passed here.
• One parameter is passed to the script, -h on this case.

• Adding ; bash keeps the shell window open after the end of the script, for e.g.:

  mate-terminal --execute bash -c "php /home/lilith/Desktop/moon/MOON/moon -h ; bash"
  

Additional variations

To keep the window open, with the path set on the script's directory, use a cd before the command. For e.g.:

mate-terminal --execute bash -c "cd /home/lilith/Desktop/moon/MOON/ && php moon -h ; bash" 

This allows the launching of some additional commands without having to to remain in the current working directory.