(old)Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

Sorry if this has been asked (or solved) but I can't figure out how to stop the menu in JWM from returning to its' previous state. I learned how to add a few custom items like XRick, XSok, Descent2, Synfig, etc. and change "Fun" to "Games" in .jwmrc. I did this as they didn't add themselves to the menu. After a few reboots or restart JWMs, the menu changes are gone. I really don't get it

Thanks for reading this.

OK. This might NOT be JWM specific.
I just installed IceWM, and the same thing is happening.
There must be a file that Puppy uses to keep track of the menu?
I dunno...

P.S. I'm booting Fat Free Pup 3.01 from the CD on a Dell Inspiron 1100.
I use a 1gig jump drive with the pup_301.sfs and zdrv_301.sfs files on it (to speed things) and the save file of course.
This is cuz the dang thing has no hard drive yet

I will have a look at it on Thursday evening. Today I have no time.

My guess is that these are old dotpups that do not have .desktop files and are modifying .jwmrc directly. In more recent puppies these changes will be overwritten next time a package is installed or the command fixmenus is run.

If this is the problem then you need to add some .desktop files to /usr/share/applications. Try copying the entries from one for a similar type of application.

To change a menu name like Fun to Games, you need to go to the file /usr/share/desktop-directories/Puppy-Fun.directory.

Then right click on it for a popup menu-->Open As Text. In the editor, change the name from Fun to Games, then save.

Type fixmenus, in a terminal console, Restart JWM in the Shutdown of the menu and you're there.

HairyWill wrote:My guess is that these are old dotpups that do not
have .desktop files and are modifying .jwmrc directly. In more recent
puppies these changes will be overwritten next time a package is
installed or the command fixmenus is run.

Will,

You're right. But what can people do? My way is to manage
everything manually. Even the installation of the package. But that
defeats the whole purpose of the xdg system.

Bruce

Ideas anyone ???

dir2pet includes a script to build a .desktop file.
Maybe a small gui to open a dotpup and to lead you through building a .desktop file would be good.

This is the way I did it:

Start a shell. Enter the following command:

geany /etc/rc.d/rc.update

Search for the line "/usr/sbin/fixmenus" and add a comment-sign # to the line. It should looks like

#/usr/sbin/fixmenus

Save the file.

Then you can edit the file .jwmrc to create your own menu.

----------------------

If you want have back the original menu you have to do this:

Start a shell. Enter the following command:

geany /etc/rc.d/rc.update

Search for the line "/usr/sbin/fixmenus" and delete the comment-sign # from the line. It should looks like

/usr/sbin/fixmenus

Save the file.

Then you enter at the shell the follwing command:

/usr/sbin/fixmenus

This command rebuilts the menu.

Finally you click on "Menu/Shutdown/Restart JWM".

Now you have the original menu.

Thanks to everyone for the input.

oli...I tried your method and the menu is holding steady

I guess that

#/usr/sbin/fixmenus

took away Puppys' ability to change it?
I found it in 2 places in rc.update and commented out both.

This was driving me nutz...thank you again

it might be safer just to open up fixmenus and put an exit command in at the top, it must also get called by the package manager

mrpectate wrote:Sorry if this has been asked (or solved) but I can't figure out how to stop the menu in JWM from returning to its' previous state. I learned how to add a few custom items like XRick, XSok, Descent2, Synfig, etc. and change "Fun" to "Games" in .jwmrc. I did this as they didn't add themselves to the menu. After a few reboots or restart JWMs, the menu changes are gone. I really don't get it

Thanks for reading this.

The problem IS NOT "fixmenus". Edit the menu entry in /usr/share/applications/file.desktop, and then use fixmenus to write it to .jwmrc. Editing .jwmrc directly doesn't work, because it gets re-written by the .desktop file on reboot.

Sorry, I searched for "file.desktop" and apparently I don't have it

In case it makes a difference, I'm running from a bootable jump drive...

Just out of curiosity, how are we suposed to edit the 'file'.desktop file so that it doesn't appear in the menu?

thanks!

E

e_mattis, this thread is very old. I can't say for sure, but Puppy may have moved on to a completely different way of doing things.

Add this to the *.desktop file for which you do not want to display in menu.

NoDisplay=true

Run fixmenus in terminal after, and jwm -restart.

Thanks guys!

Found out you can remove the *.desktop file and just link directly to the file in /usr/bin too

Thanks again!

E

Remove *.desktop may not be the 'best' way to trim excess from the menu - never tried the "NoDisplay=true" line since commenting out the Categories=<whatever> line pretty much did the trick for me. Linking to the binary .. may have drawbacks in many cases (does the app use a wrapper? are there other options in the Exec=<string> line? is it a script in a non-standard path? where'd my icon go? wine yaddayaddayadda).

Funny about early pups that didn't use XDG and templates, etc (different ballgame) - as a whole, XDG makes consistent menu updates easy to semi-automate and customize as desired. Sure there are caveats .. a fvwm95 package in wary 513 was kind of a disaster (fixmenus took way too long and various things needed a manual fix to even be functional).