gapplication(1)

1GAPPLICATION(1)                  User Commands                 GAPPLICATION(1)
2
3
4

NAME

6       gapplication - D-Bus application launcher
7

SYNOPSIS

9       gapplication help [COMMAND]
10
11       gapplication version
12
13       gapplication list-apps
14
15       gapplication launch APPID
16
17       gapplication launch APPID [FILE...]
18
19       gapplication list-actions APPID
20
21       gapplication action APPID ACTION [PARAMETER]
22

DESCRIPTION

24       gapplication is a commandline implementation of the client-side of the
25       org.freedesktop.Application interface as specified by the
26       freedesktop.org Desktop Entry Specification.
27
28       gapplication can be used to start applications that have
29       DBusActivatable set to true in their .desktop files and can be used to
30       send messages to already-running instances of other applications.
31
32       It is possible for applications to refer to gapplication in the Exec
33       line of their .desktop file to maintain backwards compatibility with
34       implementations that do not directly support DBusActivatable.
35
36       gapplication ships as part of GLib.
37

COMMANDS

39   Global commands
40       help [COMMAND]
41           Displays a short synopsis of the available commands or provides
42           detailed help on a specific command.
43
44       version
45           Prints the GLib version whence gapplication came.
46
47       list-apps
48           Prints a list of all application IDs that are known to support
49           D-Bus activation. This list is generated by scanning .desktop files
50           as per the current XDG_DATA_DIRS.
51
52       launch APPID [FILE...]
53           Launches an application.
54
55           The first parameter is the application ID in the familiar "reverse
56           DNS" style (eg: 'org.gnome.app') without the .desktop suffix.
57
58           Optionally, if additional parameters are given, they are treated as
59           the names of files to open and may be filenames or URIs. If no
60           files are given then the application is simply activated.
61
62       list-actions APPID
63           List the actions declared in the application's .desktop file. The
64           parameter is the application ID, as above.
65
66       action APPID ACTION [PARAMETER]
67           Invokes the named action (in the same way as would occur when
68           activating an action specified in the .desktop file).
69
70           The application ID (as above) is the first parameter. The action
71           name follows.
72
73           Optionally, following the action name can be one parameter, in
74           GVariant format, given as a single argument. Make sure to use
75           sufficient quoting.
76

EXAMPLES

78   From the commandline
79       Launching an application:
80
81                   gapplication launch org.example.fooview
82
83
84       Opening a file with an application:
85
86                   gapplication launch org.example.fooview ~/file.foo
87
88
89       Opening many files with an application:
90
91                   gapplication launch org.example.fooview ~/foos/*.foo
92
93
94       Invoking an action on an application:
95
96                   gapplication action org.example.fooview create
97
98
99       Invoking an action on an application, with an action:
100
101                   gapplication action org.example.fooview show-item '"item_id_828739"'
102
103
104   From the Exec lines of a .desktop file
105       The commandline interface of gapplication was designed so that it could
106       be used directly from the Exec line of a .desktop file.
107
108       You might want to do this to allow for backwards compatibility with
109       implementations of the specification that do not understand how to do
110       D-Bus activation, without having to install a separate utility program.
111
112       Consider the following example:
113
114                   [Desktop Entry]
115                   Version=1.1
116                   Type=Application
117                   Name=Foo Viewer
118                   DBusActivatable=true
119                   MimeType=image/x-foo;
120                   Exec=gapplication launch org.example.fooview %F
121                   Actions=gallery;create;
122
123                   [Desktop Action gallery]
124                   Name=Browse Gallery
125                   Exec=gapplication action org.example.fooview gallery
126
127                   [Desktop Action create]
128                   Name=Create a new Foo!
129                   Exec=gapplication action org.example.fooview create
130
131
132   From a script
133       If installing an application that supports D-Bus activation you may
134       still want to put a file in /usr/bin so that your program can be
135       started from a terminal.
136
137       It is possible for this file to be a shell script. The script can
138       handle arguments such as --help and --version directly. It can also
139       parse other command line arguments and convert them to uses of
140       gapplication to activate the application, open files, or invoke
141       actions.
142
143       Here is a simplified example, as may be installed in /usr/bin/fooview:
144
145                   #!/bin/sh
146
147                   case "$1" in
148                     --help)
149                       echo "see 'man fooview' for more information"
150                       ;;
151
152                     --version)
153                       echo "fooview 1.2"
154                       ;;
155
156                     --gallery)
157                       gapplication action org.example.fooview gallery
158                       ;;
159
160                     --create)
161                       gapplication action org.example.fooview create
162                       ;;
163
164                     -*)
165                       echo "unrecognised commandline argument"
166                       exit 1
167                       ;;
168
169                     *)
170                       gapplication launch org.example.fooview "$@"
171                       ;;
172                   esac
173
174

NOTES

180        1. Desktop Entry Specification
181           http://standards.freedesktop.org/desktop-entry-spec/latest/
182
183
184
185GIO                                                            GAPPLICATION(1)

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

COMMANDS

EXAMPLES

SEE ALSO

NOTES