Re: Creating a task launcher.....
On Wed, Jul 06, 2005 at 05:58:18PM -0400, Stephen R Laniel wrote :
> On Wed, Jul 06, 2005 at 02:48:36PM -0700, Redefined Horizons wrote:
> > I'd like to make a task launcher that opens an application I have
> > installed on my Debian system with Synaptic.
>
> I don't think you mean Synaptic. Or maybe I just got my
> binding wrong. You're saying that
>
> 1) You installed an app on your system using Synaptic, and
> now
> 2) You'd like to make a task launcher for it.
>
> If I got that right, what do you mean by 'task launcher'?
> I know Windows quite well, but I'm not sure what you mean.
> Do you mean that you'd like to be able to double-click on
> something and make it run a given application?
>
> If you're using GNOME (and if you are, you'll probably see a
> little foot icon at the top left of your screen),
> right-click on your desktop to create an icon there which
> will launch whatever application you're interested in.
>
> > Where do I find the file to link to? Am I looking for an ".exe"
> > extension, or something else?
>
> Nearly every Linux program is in one of four places:
>
> /usr/bin/
> /bin/
> /sbin
> /usr/sbin
>
> Of those, the first contains by far the largest number of
> programs. On my machine the number of files in /usr/bin is
> four times the total from the other three. /usr/bin is where
> you'll look for most of what you want.
>
> However, you shouldn't have to look there very often. Your
> GNOME menus probably already contain a menu item for every
> program you care about.
>
> But let's say you wanted to create a shortcut on your
> desktop so that you could double-click and run Firefox. You
> could look in /usr/bin (from within Nautilus, say) and see
> that there's a file called 'firefox' there. On my machine,
> 'firefox' is listed as a 'link to shell script' in Nautilus.
> If you double-click on it, it runs the web browser. So now
> you know that your browser is /usr/bin/firefox.
>
> So now right-click on the GNOME desktop. Click 'Create
> Launcher'. Fill in the form in there: 'Name' is 'Firefox'.
> 'Generic Name' is, I would suppose, 'web browser' (though I
> never fill in that field). 'Command' is '/usr/bin/firefox',
> though I believe just 'firefox' alone would do it.
>
> This may be too much explanation. I may not even be
> explaining what you're after. So I'll leave it there and see
> if you have any questions.
Well let talk about my personal experience as I was a window user
before! The main thing that can be problematic for noobs is that some
programs do NOT run either graphically or from the command line (the
equivalent of the MS-DOS mode if you want) without that you give then
some arguments on the command line... That's something really difficult
at the beginning under linux (hmmm at least to me -:)...
There something that you can try to do instead of double-clicking on
item (this way you'll also experience the user-friendliness of linux):
open a terminal (gnome-terminal or Konsole under KDE (yeah this ugly
command line)) and type 'fire' and hit twice the TAB key, that will give
you every command beginning with fire including firefox! If the command
needs some more argument, it will tell it to you! so according to these
messages, you'll be able to see what went wrong!
That's something you will appreciate a lot!
>
> > On Windows I look for the .exe, which is often in C:\Programs. I'm
> > trying to figure out the Debian equivalent.
>
> You mean C:\Program Files, don't you? I just want to make
> sure we're talking about the same thing. /usr/bin is
> basically the equivalent of C:\Program Files.
>
Well ok! but don't look to much at this! after some reading on the unix
filesystems you will understand that you can't not do such equivalent
between unix and win (I don't blame someone here). So take it for half
right for now, you'll understand that with some practice.
Keep on going! it's often difficult at the beginning but suddently
you'll see the logic in the unix world and find it really perfect! after
that you won't be able to work for a long time under win...
--
Brice Méalier
mealier_brice@yahoo.fr
Linux user nb. 372699
Debian Sarge
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