Virtualbox Unity Launcher Integration

[Daniel]

Hello,

I've created a bash script to integrate virtualbox to the Ubuntu unity panel (to list virtual machines with a right click).

The problem is updating the list, if virtualbox could do a simple check for list changes on each start, then this could auto-update.

Find it here: ​http://code.google.com/p/virtualbox-unity-launcher/

It's registered under the MIT license.

[Daniel]

Forgot to say thanks...

Thanks! your app it's great.

Daniel Scholtus.

[Technologov]

interesting...

-Technologov

[Michael Thayer]

Interesting, but it is somewhat static on the one hand (has to be run manually to update the VM list) and I don't know if we want to be adding launchers to the toolbar by default, given that real estate is rather limited there. If anything selecting a running VM by right clicking on the icon of a running VBox instance might be something worth adding by default.

[Michael Thayer]

Oh by the way, the link on your google code page is to the wrong script.

[Daniel]

Well, that's exactly why I posted it here, let me explain:

1) "but it is somewhat static on the one hand (has to be run manually to update the VM list)"

• That's what I meant with "The problem is updating the list, if virtualbox could do a simple check for list changes on each start, then this could auto-update.".
• I meant that virtualbox could update the file when a machine gets created/deleted/renamed/etc, or simply check and update it if necessary when started.

2) "I don't know if we want to be adding launchers to the toolbar by default"

• Oh, please don't! Users could get mad. There's a "Keep on Launcher" option for that already (Unity feature).
• What you get with the script is just the items added to the right click list for the virtualbox Unity launcher.
• In fact, I couldn't find a way to add the launcher to the bar from the script.

3) "If anything selecting a running VM by right clicking on the icon of a running VBox instance might be something worth adding by default."

• That's exactly what you get with this script, a right click list of virtual machines on the unity launcher for virtualbox, it doesn't matter which instance because Unity groups them all in just one launcher.
• BUT: There's a fix still needed for the scrip because the "virtualbox --startvm XX" command gives an error popup if the machine is already running. I believe it should just drive the focus to it to get the window raised. (maybe the launching command in the script could be tweaked to achieve this, or the --startvm functionality revised). I'll try to fix it from the command.

4) "Oh by the way, the link on your google code page is to the wrong script."

• Thanks a lot! The whole description was scrambled, I forgot to replace some some lines when copying & pasting :S

Thanks for the attention!

[Daniel]

Just to be clear, I'm not pretending that you add the script "as is" to the virtualbox package or whatever, oh no.

I'm suggesting the feature not the implementation, if virtualbox itself could update it's .desktop file without needing the script it would be great!

And if my script saves you a couple of minutes finding out how then I'll be really happy of being useful! :D

[Michael Thayer]

It looks to me like talking to the panel via DBus/the wrapper library is the way this is meant to be done (see this ​API description wiki entry). But to be honest I don't think this is very high priority for us, particularly given the big warnings about API instability.

[Daniel]

Thanks for the info, I wonder how I missed that.

I appreciate your honesty and don't worry, I expected to be low priority (it's a whishlist item, not a bug :P )

I'll take a look and maybe I can make a dbus version of the script :D and a wrapper launcher or something like that to get it to autoupdate.

Thanks again for the (great & quick) support!