

After creating the desktop shortcut, some desktop environments will first require you to allow launching on the file.Then save that file somewhere on your computer and put the full path in the Icon setting. Terminal=falseįor the Icon line, it is usually best to download a high quality icon from the internet, preferably in. Here is an example:įor the Terminal line, set this to either true or false based on whether or not your desired application must be launched from the terminal. For the Exec line above, you can obtain the path to your desired program by using the which command in terminal.Icon=/home/linuxconfig/Downloads/icon.pngĪfter pasting the template above and changing it to fit your needs, you can save and close the file. Keep in mind this particular example is for gedit, but can be adapted for any application. Next, paste the following template into the file.Feel free to use any text editor you would like. For this we will open a command line terminal and edit the file in nano. However, you can easily adapt the template below to make a shortcut for any application you wish. This is an application available on GNOME. That is the method we will be covering in the steps below.įor the following example, we will create a desktop shortcut to the Gedit text editing program. But they do have one method in common, which will work across all desktop environments listed above.

Some desktop environments have their own ways to add shortcuts to the desktop. $ – requires given linux commands to be executed as a regular non-privileged userĬreate desktop shortcuts in Linux step by step instructions # – requires given linux commands to be executed with root privileges either directly as a root user or by use of sudo command Privileged access to your Linux system as root or via the sudo command. Requirements, Conventions or Software Version Used Software Requirements and Linux Command Line Conventions Category

How to create desktop shortcuts in Linux.This will include setting a custom icon and name for your desktop shortcut, in order to make them easily identifiable and tailored to your tastes. In this tutorial, you will see how to create desktop shortcuts on a variety of desktop environments, including GNOME, KDE Plasma, Xfce, Cinnamon, MATE, and LXQt. Although most Linux systems rely on a sidebar app launcher or start menu, desktop shortcut launchers can allow you to open applications or websites super fast, since they live right on your desktop and make the targets only a click away. This allows for quick launching of programs or custom shortcuts. Many people find it useful to organize some of their most frequented applications as shortcuts on their desktop.
