Desktop File – How to Set Variable in .desktop File

environment-variableslauncherunity

Is there a way to set the enviroment variable in .desktop file?
I'm trying to run application (eclipse) with custom gtk style, so basically I want to get the following result by runing a .desktop file:

GTK2_RC_FILES=gtkrc.custom /path/to/eclipse

I've tryied to put it in a bash script and run it from the .desktop file, but then it does not integrate well with the Unity launcher.

Best Answer

You can add an environment variable to an application by editing its .desktop file. For example, to run "digiKam" with the environment variable APPMENU_DISPLAY_BOTH=1, find the corresponding digikam.desktop file and add the setting of the variable, via the env command, to the entry "Exec": 

Exec=env APPMENU_DISPLAY_BOTH=1 digikam -caption "%c" %i

In your case:

Exec=env GTK2_RC_FILES=gtkrc.custom /path/to/eclipse
Related Question