Today after using vim for a while for my web development, I decided to give a try to Aptana. So I just downloaded it and… I liked it. I use the Super+N feature of Unity a lot, I think it’s a killer feature of this DE. Well. I wanted to put aptana in the dock too.

Doing so is prety easy. Just unpack the aptana package you just downloaded from aptana.com in whatever folder you like. I usually put this kind of custom apps in ~/Apps . now enter into the newly created aptana folder and create a file named aptana.desktop.

Put this content into that file:

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
StartupNotify=True
Name=Aptana
Comment=Aptana Studio 3
Icon=/home/goshawk/Apps/Aptana_Studio_3/icon.xpm <- replace this whit the ABSOLUTE path in which you unpacked aptana
Exec=/home/goshawk/Apps/Aptana_Studio_3/AptanaStudio3 <- the same applies here, replace with the ABSOLUTE path
Terminal=false
Categories=Development;IDE;

Give that file executable permissions. A chmod +x aptana.desktop should be fine. You can also right click on the file from nautilus, go to properties and then flag execute. The icon of the file will change and will be the aptana icon. Your launcher is now ready. Just drag and drop it to the dock and right click on it and select lock to launcher. Well done.

If you want it to be also accessible from the unity text launcher (the one that appears when you press the windows logo on your keyboard) just copy the aptana.desktop file to ~/local/share/applications. Your aptana will be also available from the text launcher now.