Registering the Application
Application registration provides full application integration.
Has its own application group.
Has its desktop configuration files gathered under a single location. This group of desktop configuration files is called the registration package.
May have a registered help volume.
There are two ways an application can become registered:
When you install a desktop-smart application, registration occurs automatically. See "To Add a Desktop-Smart Application to Application Manager".
An existing application can be registered by creating a registration package. See "To Register an Existing or Non-Desktop Smart Application".
The use of a registration package makes the application easier to administer on the desktop. The registration package is created somewhere in the file system other than the locations used for desktop configuration files.
Adding the Application without Using a Registration Package
This is the preferred way to add application when you want Application Manager to contain only an icon to start the application.
An application added without using a registration package:
May have its own application group, but usually has its icon placed in an existing application group.
Has its desktop configuration files placed directly in locations along the desktop's search paths.
See "To Add an Application Icon to an Existing Application Group".
To Add a Desktop-Smart Application to Application Manager
A desktop-smart application is an application that is automatically registered into Application Manager when the application is installed. The application's filesets include the registration package required by the desktop.
Install the application using instructions provided with the application.
When installation is complete, double-click Reload Applications in the Desktop_Tools application group.
Verify that installation is complete:
To Register an Existing or Non-Desktop Smart Application
This is the preferred way to fully integrate an application into the desktop.
The desktop provides a tool, dtappintegrate, that creates links between the registration package files and the directories on the desktop search path.
Desktop registration is explained in Chapter 5, Registering an Application.
To Add an Application Icon to an Existing Application Group
This procedure explains how to add an application icon to an existing application group.
For example, the desktop provides an application group named System_Admin that has been reserved for various applications and scripts related to administering systems. If you have a script that users frequently run, you might want users to be able to run the script by double-clicking an icon in the System_Admin application group.
Use Create Action to create an action definition for the application.
For more information about Create Action, see Chapter 11, Creating Actions and Data Types Using Create Action.
Create an executable file with the same name as the action name in the directory for the application group. The content of the file is irrelevant.
For example, if you've created an action named "Cleanup" that runs a system administration tool, you would create the executable file:
/etc/dt/appconfig/appmanager/language/System_Admin/Cleanup
Creating and Administering General Application Groups
A general application is an application group (directory) that is not associated with one particular application product. For example, the built-in Desktop_Tools application group is a general group containing icons for a large number of applications that are related but not part of a single product.
You can create additional general application groups. For example, you might want to create a group called Games to group together the various games available on the system.
A general application group can be system-wide or personal in scope.
To Create a System-Wide General Application Group
Log in as root.
Create a directory in /etc/dt/appconfig/appmanager/language.
The name of the directory becomes the name of the application group.
Double-click Reload Applications in the Desktop_Tools application group.