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thewickerman666

Member

Registered: 2020-09-03

Posts: 2

[SOLVED] Gnome VirtualBox VM name - WM_CLASS StartupWMClass

For those of you who are struggling doing the following fixed the issue (some random name appears for the VM name in Gnome topbar when starting VirtualBox startvm)

per instructions on :
https://www.reddit.com/r/Fedora/comment … launchers/

Posting my example *.desktop file for EndeavourOS VirtualBox VM (Virtual Machine)

#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open

## filename=/home/$USER/.local/share/applications/EndeavourOS.desktop
##
## per URL=https://www.reddit.com/r/Fedora/comments/wrylkm/virtualbox_separate_pinnable_desktop_launchers/
##
## first set the following:
## /usr/bin/VBoxManage list vms # list vms with their UUIDs
## /usr/bin/VBoxManage setextradata '{UUID}' GUI/DistinguishMachineWindowGroups true
##
## in my case UUID=2c7451cf-f1b4-49c4-889a-9402e0142a1f, so run the following one time in terminal:
## /usr/bin/VBoxManage setextradata '{2c7451cf-f1b4-49c4-889a-9402e0142a1f}' GUI/DistinguishMachineWindowGroups true

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Version=1.0
Name=EndeavourOS
Comment=Starts the VirtualBox virtual machine EndeavourOS

## using VM name works:
#Exec=/usr/bin/VirtualBoxVM --startvm 'EnOS'
## using VM UUID:
Exec=/usr/bin/VirtualBoxVM --startvm '{2c7451cf-f1b4-49c4-889a-9402e0142a1f}'

## download an appropriate OS icon file from google and copy the same to a location of your liking
## point to the icon PNG file location in the below line
Icon=/home/$USER/.local/share/icons/endeavouros-icon.png

## path to the VM folder
Path=/home/$USER/VirtualBox\ VMs/EnOS

## important and ensure to append the "UUID: {UUID}" to StartupWMClass line
StartupWMClass=VirtualBox Machine UUID: {2c7451cf-f1b4-49c4-889a-9402e0142a1f}

Type=Application
Terminal=false
Categories=Office;
Hidden=false
StartupNotify=true

Will mark this post as solved. Please forgive me if i couldn't, i will check with admins on how to.
Just wanted to share this with the community, as at long last i was able to fix this vexing inconvenience. Now the VM is launched with proper OS icon and VM name in the Gnome application task bar / top bar.

cheers

Last edited by thewickerman666 (2022-11-25 20:17:57)