Downloaded the 14 or so iso Debian CDR images and now have a new sarge install w/ 2.6 kernel. Installed a few programs using the Synaptics package manager using the CD's as my repository. When I go to look for the installed programs under the applications menu none of the programs I installed are listed. I can however, start the programs from the console but I cannot then close that console window without also exiting the program as well. How do I get the programs to show up in the apps. menu? And why isn't this done by default? Perhaps my system lacks a certain utility? Thanks.

I think that you have to update the menus manually. I believe this is done differently in KDE and Gnome (and other wm for that matter)...

Oh yeah, and to open a program detached from the console, type programname &. Then you can close the console or do something else with it...

Have you tried the command 'update-menus'?

(pljvaldez, thanks for the tip in cli)

"update-menus" works like a charm. Thanks for the responses.

Wow, I was wondering about this too... so I just wanted to add my thanks as well!

I believe you need to exit the parent terminal with the "exit" command rather than using the gui window's 'X' to keep the program started with 'programname &' from closing along with the terminal.