I'm trying to install a Matlab R2011a launcher for Unity in Ubuntu 12.04. I've tried this guide (although I know it's for 11.10 and mentions that even 11.10 is an unsupported OS for Matlab R2011a) but without any satisfactory solution.
This is my launcher file, /usr/share/applications/matlab.desktop
:
#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open
[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Icon=/usr/share/icons/matlab.png
Name=MATLAB R2011a
Comment=Start MATLAB - The Language of Technical Computing
Exec=matlab -desktop
Categories=Development;
I open the dash panel and search for "matlab". This launcher is found among applications. I click it, and Matlab's splash screen shows up, but when it disappears the program doesn't start. (I've verified with htop
that no matlab-processes are running in the background either.)
If I add
Terminal=true
to the launcher file, the program starts OK, and opens a terminal as well as Matlab. However, both the terminal and Matlab itself show up in the Launcher area, with the Matlab icon, so it looks like I have two Matlab instances running when really it's only one. (Actually, they show up as two different programs, and not just two instances of the same - the icons are independent, not grouped together.)
This is definitely not optimal. I had hoped to create a launcher I can lock to the launcher area, and then that same icon will be the icon for the active Matlab instance when the program is running.
How do I create a launcher for Matlab that works as expected?
Update: I was apparently a bit unclear on my symptoms, I'll try to clarify a little.
I've also tried some suggestions from the answers, and further investigated what happens. My current setup (a launcher file with Terminal=true
and Exec=matlab -desktop -nosplash &
) renders the following behavior:
- I open Dash by pressing the Windows key on my laptop, and search for "matlab". It finds the launcher named "MATLAB R2011a". I click it.
- A terminal window opens, using the icon I referred to in the launcher file. Almost immediately, MATLAB's splash screen also opens, using the same icon (and thus being grouped with the terminal window in the launcher).
- The splash screen disappears and, so does one of the icons in the launcher. The MATLAB desktop environment opens, using a different version of the icon which is displayed next to the icon for the terminal window (not grouped with it).
I can lock the terminal window's icon to the launcher and successfully start MATLAB by clicking it, but it doesn't feel optimal that I start the program with one icon, and switch to it with another. I've also tried the following:
Exec
without the ampersand&
in the launcher command, but it didn't make a difference.- Executing
matlab -nosplash
manually from a terminal still shows the splash screen. (What, then, does the nosplash option really do?)
matlab
manually in a Terminal window?matlab
ormatlab -desktop
, either.