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How do you add a program icon to the desktop in version 14.04? I thought you could search for the program in the Dash, then drag the icon to the desktop, but I can't get it to work. I can add it to the launcher, no problem. I un-pinned an icon from the launcher and it doesn't show up in the list of apps in the Dash unless I search for it. Is this normal? I want to put it on the Desktop, hence the above question.

onyinyang
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davey
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    have you already tried these answers: http://askubuntu.com/questions/64222/how-can-i-create-launchers-on-my-desktop – mchid Jan 25 '16 at 03:32
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    You may have to enable desktop icons through unity-tweak-tool or gnome-tweak-tool. Either one of these tweak tools should work with the unity desktop. – mchid Jan 25 '16 at 03:33
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    Possible duplicate of [An easy way to create a desktop shortcut?](http://askubuntu.com/questions/450266/an-easy-way-to-create-a-desktop-shortcut) – d a i s y Jan 25 '16 at 03:58

2 Answers2

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Most of the program shortcuts (desktop files) are stored in /usr/share/applications/ folder. So, if you want to create a desktop shortcut to an application that is in the dash, open a terminal window and type in the following:

cp /usr/share/applications/nameofapp.desktop ~/Desktop/

then you need to make the shortcut executable to work. Type in the following from a terminal window to make it executable:

chmod +x ~/Desktop/nameofapp.desktop

Hope this helps!

muru
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Terrance
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in File Manager, I navigated to /usr/share/applications and right-clicked each icon (one at a time) and selected "copy to" and then clicked "Desktop" then "Select" ...voila! not as technical an approach, but it worked.

djlen_ny
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