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l0b0
Asked: 2012-07-20 11:08:27 +0800 CST

Awesome WM menu missing Firefox

  • 772

After sudo apt-get install awesome awesome-extra and logging into it (with no previous configuration that I know of), there's no menu entry for Firefox. All my other stuff is there - Mutt, Meld, jEdit, BOINC, etc., only Firefox is missing. I have no ~/.config/awesome/ directory, so there should be no override in place.

firefox

3 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Try the menubar instead. It's mapped to modkey + p in the default config, and appears to be built using .desktop files:

    local menubar = require("menubar")
...
awful.key({ modkey }, "p", function() menubar.show() end)
    • 2

  2. By default on Ubuntu, when you install Awesome, you'll get some menu items coming from the Debian menu system. This is because the default rc.lua has near the top: require("debian.menu") and then later in rc.lua, under the code laying out the menu, you'll see:

    mymainmenu = awful.menu({ items = {  [stuff snipped]
                                    { "Debian", debian.menu.Debian_menu.Debian },
                                     [stuff snipped]
                                   }
                        })

    This means your browser(s) will be located at: "Debian" --> "Applications" --> "Network" --> "Web Browsing". Some apps, however, may not install a Debian menu item. Firefox, for example, seems to no longer have one.

    Having said all that, I think it's preferable to just set up your own menus, because the Debian menu will have all kinds of stuff from different desktop environments you've installed. The Debian menu system is also considered rather outdated, even by the Debian developers. Here's a a quick read of the basics of how to set up menus in Awesome. If you want to see how I set up my menus, you can take a look at my rc.lua linked in my profile.

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  3. I'm a little late on the reply here - but I found this question while having the same problem and thought I'd put my fix here for anyone else:

    If you copy your /etc/xdg/awesome file to ~/.config/awesome then look in the debian directory, there is a menu.lua there.

    Open the file and find

    Debian_menu["Debian_Applications_Network"] = {
-- whatever elements are already there
}

    and add the element

    { "Web Browsing", Debian_menu["Debian_Applications_Network_Web_Browsing"] },

    to that list.

    Then you can find where Debian_menu["Debian_Applications_Network_File_Transfer"] menu is and add another menu after it (so it's easy to find later)

    Debian_menu["Debian_Applications_Network_Web_Browsing"] = {
{"Firefox", "/usr/bin/firefox"},
}

    Then quit awesome and log back in and you should have Firefox in your menu.

    NOTE: I put /usr/bin/firefox as that is where my executable for firefox is - to find where yours is type which firefox in the command line.

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