I know this should be a simple thing to do, but I've searched around, and haven't found the way to do it- partially because I'm not sure what to call it.

I want to create a command that will start a program. I want to be able to open the program with this command regardless of whether I am working in the directory where the program is located or not. Also, is there a name for doing this?

I've adjusted my .bash_profile file to include in my $PATH the directory where the program is located, but it still is not working, and I'm not sure what else to try.

Thanks for your help!!!

janestclaire

Try something like this:
/bin/sh -c "/usr/bin/gimp-2.2" or
-e sh -c \"/usr/bin/elinks\"

I use IceWM and looking at all of the programs in the menu those are the 2 commands that are set to launch various programs.

For apps that aren't on the menu I use Grun, it is an app launcher, I just browse to where the app is or type in the name.

I think I know what you mean. I don't know a specific name for it. For my example I'll use doom legacy, because that has a similar issue. If I type from my home directory:

/mnt/Programs/doom/lsdldoom -iwad doom.wad

It won't work because I have to be in the /mnt/Programs/doom directory for lsdldoom to find the iwad. I could also provide the path to the iwad in the same command but that can become a long command to type and that's more possibility to make typos.
I would create a script like this:

#!/bin/bash
cd /mnt/Programs/doom
lsdldoom -iwad doom.wad
cd ~

and save it in my ~ directory. Don't forget to make it executable.

Thanks Dracolich- that worked! (at least it seems to be working)

Is this a "shell script"? Also, you said to make sure it is executable. I'm not sure how, but I took the example you gave, modified it for my program, and made the file using vi editor. Then I just saved it into my home directory. When I typed the name of the vi file into the command line it opened my program.

But, I didn't do anything special to make it executable-- can you explain this a little more?

Thanks again!!

janestclaire

Use ; for multiple commands, i.e.,

cd /mnt/Programs/doom ; lsdldoom -iwad doom.wad ; cd ~

does multiple commands. [And use ; as often as you want.]

Sheng-Chieh

Yeah, I know about the semicolons. That just makes the script two lines instead of four.

This qualifies as a shell script - a script file that executes a series of shell commands.

Maybe RH does some things automagically that Slackware doesn't. If you type

ls -l <filename>

for your script file what permissions do you see? (e.g. -rwxrwxr--) X's indicate execute permission. When I make a script I have to use 'chmod +x filename' to add the execute permission before it'll run.

I'm not sure why it worked before, because after ls -l, the permissions were -rw-r-----. However, I made it an executable just in case.

Sorry- I didn't think about looking at the ls -l to figure out that it was an executable. I'm still pretty new to this stuff.

Thanks again!
janestclaire