Empathy – How to Automatically Set Status to Available on Login in Ubuntu 11.04

After some searching, I found an app that communicates with Empathy via dbus. I pulled some code from that and created a script that will set your status.

Setting it up is pretty easy:

Download the script here (github page).

It requires some python libraries that are in the repos (and might be installed by default):

sudo apt-get install python-dbus python-notify

Then to set it to start on login, run Startup Applications, click Add, and fill in the fields like this:

• Name: Custom -- Start Empathy Busy
• Command: /usr/bin/python /path/to/empathy_set_status.py dnd
• Comment: Start empathy and set status to busy (do no disturb).

The command field includes what status to set. If you don't want busy (dnd), then you can use one of these values: available, dnd, away, xa, hidden, offline.

Now when you log in, the script it should run empathy, wait a bit, and then set your status. You should see a notification when it tries to set your status.

I don't check that the status is set correctly, so I just have a wait time to hope that empathy will be ready to let us change the status. Adjust your time if it's not working. Increase the value of EMPATHY_STARTUP_SECONDS until it works when you login. If you need to enter a password to unlock your keychain for your IM login, the delay will have to be long enough for Empathy to start up, for you to enter your password, and for Empathy to log into your accounts.

20.04 and later

1. If not yet done by default install gnome-startup-applications
2. Search and open "Startup Applications"

3. click add to enter the command including options of your application as you would run it from terminal (you may have to give in the full path if it runs from a non-standard location)

• This will add a .desktop file in your ~/.config/autostart

14.04 and later

1. Open the Dash and search for "Startup Applications"

2. Now click on Add and give in the command to run the application. This can be found in Main Menu if installed (see below)

Using Main Menu (alacarte) to find the terminal command to run a given program:

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

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

3. Now note the command for that program .

Non GUI approach

Advanced users may want to manually 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

You may have to give this file execute permission.