Quicktip: Create app launchers in Ubuntu 17.10

December 31, 2017

I finally managed to update my system to Ubuntu 17.10. After doing that I wanted to install TeamSpeak 3, which does not come in a .deb file nor is it available through a PPA. While installing and launching it from the cli is straight forward, I wanted to have a launcher for it, so I could start it from Ubuntu 17.10’s application menu like any other app.

After not being satisfied with what Google search brought up (all I found suggested to install alacarte) I did dig a little deeper. What I found is that all you really need to do is to create a .desktop file in ~/.local/share/applications with a specific format.
Check the format¹ based on my TeamSpeak 3 launcher:

#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open
[Desktop Entry]
Version=3
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Name=TeamSpeak 3
Exec=/home/melo/Downloads/Apps/TeamSpeak3-Client-linux_amd64/ts3client_runscript.sh
Icon=/home/melo/Downloads/Apps/TeamSpeak3-Client-linux_amd64/teamspeak_small.png
StartupWMClass=ts3client_linux_amd64

Now just double-click the .desktop file and your application will launch and show up in the left dock (where you can add it to favorites, too).