Hi! I'm using Centos 5.0 (A Red Hat build). I am using mysqld with a GUI called Navicat. After extracting the Navicar tarball, it created two icons in a Navicat folder. One was called "Navi_Start" which launches the program. The other is an icon, a .png file. The program works fine and I have it connected to the mysqld structure. The problem is that I do not know how to copy the "Navi_Start" file to the desktop and then change the icon to the file that came in the folder, so the developer can easily launch the Navicat GUI. Any help?

Thanks!

You can create a desktop icon by right clicking on a blank spot on the desktop. A menu pops up and you left click on Create New -> Link to Application. A properties window pops up. You fill out all of the slots in the properties form to create a desktop application icon. To change the icon itself click on the icon button on the General page on the Properties window. Click on other icons and browse to find the icon that you want to display on the desktop.

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Steve Stites

Thanks for the help, it was right on.

Navicat is the GUI front end for mysqld. The program itself is contained in one folder (unlike Windows). Any suggestions as to where I should store these "program" folders?

Put executable programs in a directory on your PATH. You can display your PATH with:

echo $PATH

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Steve Stites

Best stored under /usr/local, which should already be on the path. Alternatively - and this would in fact be the best choice - under /opt, but you'd have to include that in your path yourself.

I figured out how to manipulate the PATH. Thanks for all guidance. My next question is: If I put any executable file in my PATH, or add a folder with an executable file to my PATH, will it launch when double clicked? When I had the Navicat folder stored on the outside of the PATH, Centos (Redhat-based distro) always asked me what I wanted to do with the file, "Open, Display" etc. Is this correct about the PATH?

Thanks again for you help.

"Alternatively - and this would in fact be the best choice - under /opt, but you'd have to include that in your path yourself."

Why is this the best choice?

Oh, just a matter of following the FHS standards. Opt is where you should put (binary) third party applications. /usr/local tends to be used for packages you compile yourself.

As for clicking icons, the only reason that a distribution asks you what to do is because it doesn't know what to do until the binary is in its path. Of course, you need to add a link to the executable in the navicat folder, not the folder as a whole.

The program that you want to use when you click on a file must be in the PATH. There is also a further condition to be met. KDE keeps a mime list of what program to start when a particular file extension is clicked. I am not in KDE right now but from memory you get to KDE's mime list by clicking on Control Center -> KDE Components -> file extensions.

That gets you to a window where you can change or add entries as to what program is executed when you click on a particular file extension.

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Steve Stites

Many thanks to all.

TW