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18

How can I make an application automatically start when I have logged in?

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The title and body of this question don't match.... Are we answering about OS startup or login? – belacqua Nov 16 '12 at 23:43

6 Answers

up vote 61 down vote accepted

12.10 and later

  • Open the Dash and search for "Startup Applications"

    enter image description here

11.10 - 12.04 LTS

  • Click on the cog wheel on the top right corner of your screen and choose Startup Applications, or type "Startup..." in the Dash.

    enter image description here

  • Now click on Add and give in the command to run the application. This can be found in Main Menu if installed (see below) or as shown in this question.

    enter image description here

11.04

  • Click the button on the top-right corner and select System Settings

    enter image description here

  • Now click on startup applications.

    enter image description here

  • proceed as shown above

Using Main Menu (alacarte Install alacarte)

  • Firstly open the program 'Main Menu' (type Menu in the Dash)

    enter image description here

  • Now select the program which you want to add to startup and click on properties .

    enter image description here

  • Now note the command for that program .

    enter image description here

Non GUI approach

Advanced users may want to put a .desktop file in ~/.config/autostart to run applications after a user login. This may have following content:

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Name=<Name of application as displayed>
Exec=<command to execute>
Icon=<full path to icon>
Comment=<optinal comments>
X-GNOME-Autostart-enabled=true
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in 12.04 you can run "Startup Aplications" from the dash the same way like in 12.10 – jutky Jan 2 at 23:20
@jutky: the difference is, that we dont have it any more in the me-menu from the cogwheel in 12.10. – Takkat Jan 2 at 23:36
useful the "Non GUI approach" part, I was searching that folder! – Pisu Jan 7 at 17:50
@Pisu: on a vanilla installation you may have to create this directory first to be able to use it. – Takkat Jan 7 at 18:22
1  
The Start-up Applications Preferences dialogue can be brought up from ALT+F2 gnome-session-properties if you can't find it in menus (e.g. in Gnome Shell) – mtdevans Jan 28 at 22:59
up vote 15 down vote

For 11.04 and newer see here: How to start applications at startup automatically in 11.04?

For older versions: If the program you wish to run on startup is in the Applications menu, you can drag-and-drop it into the Startup Applications window to add it to the list.

enter image description here

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up vote 10 down vote

Both Unity and Xfce4 have GUI programs that allow you to control startup applications.

For Unity:

enter image description here

enter image description here

For Xfce4 Startup tool is available in Settings > Session and Startup

enter image description here Image courtesy of Xubuntu Geek xubuntugeek

If the GUI is not what you want, and you want is more advance control, then you can put .desktop files in the ~/.config/autostart/ directory for Xfce4, and a .desktop file in ~/.config/autostart for Unity to run applications after a user login.

Check this question to get more help on creating .desktop files:

Also note if you want a startup application to start only in XFCE, but not in Unity, you have to put the line OnlyShowIn=XFCE in the .desktop file. It is OnlyShowIn=Unity for a Unity only application.

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From your answer what I get is that for both you put .desktop file in ~/.config/autostart/ – Eduard Florinescu Aug 30 '12 at 7:37
Please if you know by heart what would be that GUI program, for Unity it is Startup Applications(easy to search), for xfce ? – Eduard Florinescu Aug 30 '12 at 7:38
up vote 3 down vote

You can use GNOME Startup Application. enter image description here

Click the Add button and then add the full command to open the application you want. If you don't know the path of the command you can do

which name_of_commmand

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up vote 2 down vote

You can use the feature to "Remember Currently Running Applications" in the "System/Preferences/Startup Applications" preferences window. Which (when enabled) will "remember" all the programs that you are using and will re-open them after a reboot or when starting the system for the first time in a day.

This is great when you don't have enough time to make notes of what were you doing the last time and you wish an application to open if it was running the last time.

If you wish to remove an application from this feature simply close it and go to this function and press the "Remember Currently Running Application" in order to refresh the list of the programs that will be opened the next time.

A screenshot is placed here in order to illustrate.

enter image description here

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The only thing I do not like about this one is that your/my wireless is slower to come up than my browser is in loading when it was active. Every tab needs to be reloaded after wireless picks up. – Rinzwind May 8 '11 at 17:17
Good point. That's why I don't save that preference with the browser open :) Docky is owning the control for my browser with an icon on it. But yours is a good point! Thank you. – Geppettvs D'Constanzo May 9 '11 at 20:50
up vote 0 down vote

Alt+F2, then gnome-help ghelp:user-guide?gosstartsession-2.

Click Run, wait a sec, and then follow the directions.

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cool I know the part to add but not the commands... so do I google them? or should I hit alt+f2 then put the name of the program... if it finds it, I'll say run in terminal... to display the command? – user11383 Feb 24 '11 at 4:43
@Bob, which application do you want to run on start up? – Oxwivi Feb 24 '11 at 5:35

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