AppImages are great: a single runtime containing all of the required dependencies for the app to run, in a double-click binary you can run from anywhere on your system.
And therein lies the rub.
When I download an AppImage for software like Audacity, Kdenlive, etc., it’s to a folder or my desktop. To run it, I have navigate to the folder and double-click on the binary as unless I manually choose to create a .desktop launcher it won’t appear in any app launcher/menu.
Solutions exist, of course.
In 2022 I featured a terrific tool to integrate AppImages with Ubuntu easily. With that tool installed, the first time you run a new AppImage you can click a button to create a system shortcut for it, and move the runtime to a (safe) directory of your choosing.
Great stuff, but that tool hasn’t been updated since 2022 (it still works in Ubuntu 24.04 LTS if you use the DEB from the ‘continuous release’ section of the the Github, though).
But there’s a new(ish) GTK4/libadwaita app for avid AppImage users on Ubuntu to try instead.
Gear Lever is Essential for AppImage Users
Lorenzo Paderi’s Gear Lever is a simple, straightforward app to streamline managing AppImages on Ubuntu and other Linux distributions.
It can organise and move AppImage runtimes for you; create desktop entries with app metadata and icons to make it easy to launch apps and pin them to the dock; update your AppImages in-place, roll back to older versions, or even run multiple versions side-by-side.
All very handy, and it looks great too!
Features of Gear Lever at-a-glance:
- Integrate AppImages into your app menu with just one click
- Drag and drop files directly from your file manager
- Keep all the AppImages organized in a custom folder
- Open new AppImages directly with Gear lever
- Manage updates: keep older versions installed or replace them with the latest release
- Save CLI apps with their executable name automatically
Sound good? Try it out – source code is available on Github (easily compiled using GNOME Builder), or for the low-effort route, fetch the official Flatpak from Flathub.
• Get Gear Lever on Flathub