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Common Desktop Environment: User's Guide > Chapter 6 Running
Applications from the Desktop
Running Applications Using Application Manager |
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Application Manager is a container for the applications and other tools available on your system. Most of the applications and tools in Application Manager were placed there by your system administrator or are built into the desktop. Although configuring Application Manager is primarily a system administration task, you can also make personal customizations to Application Manager. The Application Manager window is a special File Manager view of a special folder on your system. It looks very much like a File Manager window, except that the iconic and text path are not shown. The top level of Application Manager is special because other folders and files are never created directly in it. Instead, folders in other locations are gathered into this location automatically when you log in. The top level of Application Manager contains a set of application groups. Each application group is a folder containing one or more icons that you use to start applications. An icon that starts an application is called an action icon or application icon. Some application groups contain other useful application files such as sample data files, templates, and ``read me'' files. The application groups in your Application Manager are either built-in or registered by your system administrator. Application registration is a process by which an application lets the desktop know of its presence. The application groups in Application Manager are gathered together each time you log in. The application groups may be located on your system or on other systems throughout the network. The desktop provides these built-in application groups that are containers for various tools and utilities available on your system:
Since Application Manager is closely related to the File Manager window, it uses most of the same menus, commands, and other features. For more information about using the Application Manager menus and dialog boxes, see Chapter 5 “Managing Files with File Manager”
This procedure copies an application icon from Application Manager to the workspace (backdrop). This makes the icon available when you don't have an Application Manager window open.
The contents of your Application Manager are built each time you log in. Each time it is built, it searches certain system and network locations for applications. If your system administrator adds an application to your system or to an application server while you are in a session, you must update your Application Manager if you want the new application to be registered immediately. There are two ways to update Application Manager:
A personal application group is an application group that you can alter, since you have write permission to it.
This section describes several advanced Application Manager concepts:
In File Manager and Application Manager, files and folders are represented as icons, and these icons are usually labeled with the file name. Action icons are sometimes an exception to this rule. For example, display the pop-up menu for the action icon in the Desktop_Tools application group labeled Digital Clock. Notice that the file name, which is shown at the top of the pop-up menu, is not the same as the label. In most cases, you do not need to know the action file name. However, there are other situations, in addition to the pop-up menu, where you may see the file name. For example, if you use the Copy File dialog box to copy the icon (by selecting the file and choosing Copy to from the Selected menu), the dialog box will display the file name. Application Manager behaves very much like File Manager. This is because Application Manager is a File Manager view of a special folder on your system used to gather registered applications. Ordinarily, you do not need to know the location of this special folder. However, its location may be useful to you if you are trying to troubleshoot problems. Login Manager creates the Application Manager folder each time you log in. Its location is:
where special_folder_name is a name assigned by the system that is unique for your system and login name.
The desktop provides a tool that helps you create icons for running scripts, applications, and other commands. You may want to use this tool if you have a personal application your system administrator has not configured for you. For example, suppose you have your own favorite spreadsheet application that you usually start by typing a command into a terminal emulator window:
You can create an icon that runs this command so that you won't have to continue manually typing it. To do this, you must create a special desktop ``macro'' called an action. You can also create a data type for the data_files if you like. The desktop includes a tool called Create Action that makes it easy to create actions and data types. To open the Create Action window, double-click the Create Action icon in the Desktop_Tools application group. To see online instructions for using the window:
Create Action:
You can move or copy that icon to other locations—for example, to a personal application group that you've created. When an application is registered in Application Manager, it has its own application group. This application group is available to all users on the system. Registering applications is an advanced task, since it requires you to be the root user. For instructions, see the Advanced User's and System Administrator's Guide. |
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