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I noticed that applications distributed as 'appimage' when run, they did not present the "add to favorites" in the command bar, when you right click on the icon. Why? Is there an alternative? Ubuntu 18.04.

Felice Pollano
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1 Answers1

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In order to be able to "pin" any application, including an appimage, as a favorite, it needs to have a permanently installed launcher. A launcher is a text file with .desktop extension, placed in specific locations (~.local/share/applications, /usr/share/applications and others), that contains instructions for your desktop environment on how to run the application, what icon to use, etc.

Many appimages contain their own .desktop file and icons inside the .AppImage file. You typically need to edit so it correctly points to your appimage. Place it in the folder .local/share/applications, so it automatically will appear in Application overview. Alternatively, create your own .desktop file. A few appimages may automatically install a launcher on first run.

Finding and using .desktop file and icon provided by the application

In many cases, the appimage provides a .desktop file and icons. That will be included in the .AppImage file. That .AppImage file contains a file system that is mounted when the application is running.

To find these files, run the AppImage. This will cause the AppImage to be mounted in your file system. You can then access the application's files with your file manager.

For example:

‣ Run the AppImage. I take OpenShot-v2.5.1-x86_64.AppImage as an example.

‣ Run the mount command to see where the AppImage is mounted. For Openshot, I see

OpenShot-v2.5.1-x86_64.AppImage on /tmp/.mount_v87XIC type fuse.OpenShot-v2.5.1-x86_64.AppImage (ro,nosuid,nodev,relatime,user_id=1000,group_id=1000)

in the output of mount.

‣ Navigate in your file manager to, in this example, /tmp/.mount_v87XIC.

  • We find a org.openshot.OpenShot.desktop that we can copy and eventually edit to use as a launcher.
  • We find an Openshot icon (/tmp/.mount_v87XIC/usr/bin/openshot-qt.svg), that we can copy to ~/.local/share/icons to use as a sharp, scalable icon.
vanadium
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