I don’t see why not. The example config file has a whole bunch of complex commands, far more than just the java --jar you need to run a Java application.
Don’t most desktop environments already have this?
If you want to include this as an option when right clicking the desktop, you will probably need to patch this into the DE of your choice, however I think at least KDE has an option for custom right click actions.
I see, I didn’t know KDE had that, does KDE allow java apps to be used as the right click action? As for GNOME, I’m still trying to figure it out.
Until then, I will post the link to the app in the future. It needs some beautification, and quality of life changes so you and the others can use it as you use sudo apt update and upgrade to update your PCs.
These are used by Plasma and most KDE apps that deal with files.
Krusader has a more powerful system for this called UserActions, but they’re exclusive to Krusader and afaik Krusader is also compatible with service menus, so these are much less portable: docs.kde.org/trunk5/en/…/useractions.html
Don’t be discouraged, doing something from scratch is always a great learning opportunity and even if this isn’t the first iteration of such a tool there is room improvement, for instance, I don’t think any of the tools that allow creation .desktop shortcuts interface with any context menu as yours would do in the future, so that could be a cool feature to show off!
An application and programs that use shell as their application, for example, IntelliJ IDEA use ‘idea.sh’ to run the IDE, so it would be useful for people to right-click and just create the ‘.desktop’ file right away.
I believe some BSDs use it too, and WSL2 will make Linux applications automatically appear on Windows, so editing desktop files may be useful there too. Plus, you don’t need to deal with different architectures (aarch vs amd64).
Alright, but maybe take a look into something like Zenity. The task done by your tool doesn’t really justify installing a huge JRE, when a simple bash script would suffice.
I didn’t make the tool, I merely answered a question.
Had I wanted to develop such a tool myself I probably would’ve gone Python + Qt6 or used some Rust GTK wrapper, or maybe dust off Gambas if all I want it a a few buttons and text fields.
Because that’s what I learned from Uni, didn’t want that skill to go to waste. I was thinking about how it would be easier to make the apps (plain applications that use executables and shell to run) .desktop file without any hassle (for new Linux users).
Also, Python was two semesters ago, so I forgot all about it.
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