Manual: gapplication

gapplication()												      gapplication()

Name
       gapplication - D-Bus application launcher

SYNOPSIS
       gapplication help [COMMAND]
       gapplication version
       gapplication list-apps
       gapplication launch 
       gapplication launch  [FILE…]
       gapplication list-actions 
       gapplication action   [PARAMETER]

DESCRIPTION
       gapplication is a commandline implementation of the client-side of the org.freedesktop.Application interface as spec‐
       ified by the freedesktop.org Desktop Entry Specification.

       gapplication  can be used to start applications that have DBusActivatable set to true in their .desktop files and can
       be used to send messages to already-running instances of other applications.

       It is possible for applications to refer to gapplication in the Exec line of their .desktop file	 to  maintain  back‐
       wards compatibility with implementations that do not directly support DBusActivatable.

       gapplication ships as part of GLib.

COMMANDS
       help [COMMAND]
	  Displays a short synopsis of the available commands or provides detailed help on a specific command.

       version
	  Prints the GLib version whence gapplication came.

       list-apps
	  Prints  a list of all application IDs that are known to support D-Bus activation.  This list is generated by scan‐
	  ning .desktop files as per the current XDG_DATA_DIRS.

       launch  [FILE…]
	  Launches an application.

	  The first parameter is the application ID in the familiar ‘reverse DNS’ style	 (e.g.	org.gnome.app)	without	 the
	  .desktop suffix.

	  Optionally,  if  additional  parameters are given, they are treated as the names of files to open and may be file‐
	  names or URIs.  If no files are given then the application is simply activated.

       list-actions 
	  List the actions declared in the application’s .desktop file.	 The parameter is the application ID, as above.

       action   [PARAMETER]
	  Invokes the named action (in the same way as would occur when activating  an	action	specified  in  the  .desktop
	  file).

	  The application ID (as above) is the first parameter.	 The action name follows.

	  Optionally,  following the action name can be one parameter, in GVariant format, given as a single argument.	Make
	  sure to use sufficient quoting.

EXAMPLES
   From the commandline
       Launching an application:

	  gapplication launch org.example.fooview

       Opening a file with an application:

	  gapplication launch org.example.fooview ~/file.foo

       Opening many files with an application:

	  gapplication launch org.example.fooview ~/foos/*.foo

       Invoking an action on an application:

	  gapplication action org.example.fooview create

       Invoking an action on an application, with an action:

	  gapplication action org.example.fooview show-item '"item_id_828739"'

   From the Exec lines of a .desktop file
       The commandline interface of gapplication was designed so that it could be used directly from  the  Exec	 line  of  a
       .desktop file.

       You  might want to do this to allow for backwards compatibility with implementations of the specification that do not
       understand how to do D-Bus activation, without having to install a separate utility program.

       Consider the following example:

	  [Desktop Entry]
	  Version=1.1
	  Type=Application
	  Name=Foo Viewer
	  DBusActivatable=true
	  MimeType=image/x-foo;
	  Exec=gapplication launch org.example.fooview %F
	  Actions=gallery;create;

	  [Desktop Action gallery]
	  Name=Browse Gallery
	  Exec=gapplication action org.example.fooview gallery

	  [Desktop Action create]
	  Name=Create a new Foo!
	  Exec=gapplication action org.example.fooview create

   From a script
       If installing an application that supports D-Bus activation you may still want to put a file in /usr/bin so that your
       program can be started from a terminal.

       It is possible for this file to be a shell script.  The script can handle arguments such as --help and --version	 di‐
       rectly.	 It can also parse other command line arguments and convert them to uses of gapplication to activate the ap‐
       plication, open files, or invoke actions.

       Here is a simplified example, as may be installed in /usr/bin/fooview:

	  #!/bin/sh

	  case "$1" in
	    --help)
	      echo "see ‘man fooview’ for more information"
	      ;;

	    --version)
	      echo "fooview 1.2"
	      ;;

	    --gallery)
	      gapplication action org.example.fooview gallery
	      ;;

	    --create)
	      gapplication action org.example.fooview create
	      ;;

	    -*)
	      echo "unrecognized commandline argument"
	      exit 1
	      ;;

	    *)
	      gapplication launch org.example.fooview "$@"
	      ;;
	  esac

SEE ALSO
       Desktop	  Entry	   Specification    ,    gdbus(1)
       gdbus(1)>, xdg-open(1) xdg-open(1)>, desktop-file-validate(1) desktop-file-validate(1)>

													      gapplication()