Fix "Add to Favorites" for custom apps in Ubuntu

Hi Average Linux User, Thank you for sharing this fantastic article on adding custom apps to the dock. I have downloaded this app called ClickUp, but it gets a new update with a unique version number every other week, and the exec path in /usr/share/applications//yourapp.desktop doesn’t work. For example, when I open this app called ClickUp-3.0.4.AppImage gets a new update with a different version number ClickUp-3.0.5.AppImage. Should I include a regex in the exec path? Or is there an alternative solution?

#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open
[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Exec=/home/john/Downloads/ClickUp-3.0.5.AppImage
Name=ClickUp
Comment=ClickUp App
Icon=/home/john/Downloads/clickup-logo.png

Hi Average Linux User, Thank you for sharing this fantastic article on adding custom apps to the dock. I have downloaded this app called ClickUp, but it gets a new update with a unique version number every other week, and the exec path in /usr/share/applications//yourapp.desktop doesn’t work. For example, when I open this app called ClickUp-3.0.4.AppImage gets a new update with a different version number ClickUp-3.0.5.AppImage. Should I include a regex in the exec path? Or is there an alternative solution?

#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open [Desktop Entry] Version=1.0 Type=Application Terminal=false Exec=/home/john/Downloads/ClickUp-3.0.5.AppImage Name=ClickUp Comment=ClickUp App Icon=/home/john/Downloads/clickup-logo.png

Thanks for that. It worked really well, but when I first did it I left the app as “Yourapp” (I was trying to add Audacity). I did it again and got to add Audacity, but when I click on the icon it acually opens “Yourapp” - which is Audacity. I would like to remove “Yourapp” so that Audacity and its icon remain alone - are you able to tell me how to reverse my error?

Thanks. Worked nicely

This also works (without the need for root permissions) if you copy yourapp.desktop to ~/.local/share/applications. This is useful if your app is only supposed to be usable by a single account.

Thanks, it works for me and the Godot engine application !

Thanks ALU! Your channel has been a great source to learn how to use linux. Great guide with clear instructions and without any clutter! Have a great day!

Thank you! Worked like a charm. Video was well put together and easy to follow.

Worked for me to add Eclipse to favorites: Launch the application –> Right click on the status bar of it (on top of the opened window) –> chose “Move to workspace down” –> right click on the icon in the launcher bar –> Add to favorites

Hope will help ;)

Thanks! This was an amazing tutorial!

Tried that with Palemoon installed with gdebi from a deb package on Ubuntu 20.04. Worked fine for adding the app to the application menu, however it does not show the option to add to favorites on right clicking (when application opened in the dock). Any ideas? Thanks for the post, very useful

I am trying to run a driver and it is asking me for root permissions… is there a way to avoid this? Thanks.

This works for me on Ubuntu 20.04

• click activities
• search for your app
• right click app - Add to Favorites

no programming necessary

Thank you! For me it's working fine on Ubuntu 20.04 with one little difference: add to favorites is only possible in menu with a right mouse click. But anyway, it works perfekt.

Thanks alot for the Howto, but i cant get the Icons to work. The Apps i use dont come with a Icon.png. Any idea how to make it work?

Thanks for this tutorial. It helps a lot! It worked fine on one of my pcs. But on the other it does this thing where it launches the app in a new icon : https://framapic.org/pznT6Br1niFX/mLkQHfQ97IRN.gif. Any idea what could be causing this?