NAME
update-menus - generate Debian menu system
SYNOPSIS
update-menus [-v] [-d] [-h|--help] [--version] [--menufilesdir <dir>]
[--menumethod <method>] [--nodefaultdirs] [--stdout]
DESCRIPTION
Before the advent of update-menus, when the system administrators
installed a package onto a Debian system, they would need to edit
various window manager configuration files to make the new program show
up on, for example, fvwm’s menus. The menus could easily become out of
sync with what programs were actually available, with some menu items
that didn’t work, and other programs that lacked a menu entry. update-
menus and Debian’s menu package aim to solve this problem.
update-menus automatically generates menus of installed programs for
window managers and other menu programs. It should be run whenever a
menufile(5) or menu-method file is changed. update-menus will be run
automatically when Debian packages that contain menu files are
installed on or removed from the system.
update-menus uses the package-supplied menu entry files (in
/usr/share/menu) for its information about the menus (but this can be
overruled by the system administrator/user; see below). If a menu entry
file is executable, update-menus executes the menu entry file, and uses
its stdout to generate the menu database.
OPTIONS
-v Verbose output. Shows all arguments to the /etc/menu-methods
programs.
-d Debug output. Generates loads of unintelligible output.
-h, --help
Display usage help and exit.
--menufilesdir <dir>
Adds directory <dir> to the list of directories to search for
menu files in.
--menumethod <method>
Process only the menu method <method> instead of all the menu
methods found.
--nodefaultdirs
Disables the search of menu entries in system menu directories.
--nodpkgcheck
Do not discard menu entries for packages that are not installed
according to dpkg.
--remove
Remove the menus by calling the menu-methods with --remove.
--stdout
Output the menu list in a format suitable as input for install-
menu or a menu method file.
--version
Output version information and exit.
CONFIGURATION
There are several ways to tune the operation of update-menus:
per menu entry, in /etc/menu/$package
In these directories the system administrator or user can
override the default menu files (If a file /etc/menu/$package
exists, than the corresponding /usr/share/menu/$package file
isn’t read any more). Users who want to override the system wide
defaults put their files in ~/.menu. See also menufile(5)
per window-manager in /etc/menu-methods/$wm
In these configuration files, one can tune generated
system.${wm}rc files for each individual window manager. For
example, one can specify that the wm should ignore any icons
that the packages may supply, or set the default wrapper for
text-only applications (usually, an xterm is started to run a
text-only application like vi). Users who want to override the
system wide defaults put their files in ~/.menu-methods. For
more info, see /usr/share/doc/menu/html.
globally, in /etc/menu-methods/translate_menus
This file contains translations that will be performed for all
menu entries and all window managers. You can specify things
like: ‘All sections that start with "Games" should be mapped to
"Applications/Games"’, or ‘menuentry "gnuplot" should have a
title of "GnuTeken"’. Look at the default /etc/menu-
methods/translate_menus for an example. Users who want to
override the system default translate file, put one in ~/.menu-
methods/translate_menus. Note: This should not be used for a
full translation of the menu. Use po files as explained in the
source package.
error report configuring, in /etc/menu-methods/menu.config
This file contains general information for the overall behaviour
of update-menus. At the moment you can only configure how
verbose the output of update-menus is, and where it sends the
output. The amount of information is specified by
‘verbosity=VAL’. Use VAL=quiet to stop update-menu from
reporting anything but the most important errors, VAL=normal,
VAL=verbose, VAL=debug for progressively more output.
To specify where the output should go, use ‘method=stdout’,
‘method=stderr’, or ‘method=syslog facility priority’.
‘Facility’ is one of auth, authpriv, authcron, authdaemon,
authkern, authlocal0, authlocal1, authlocal2, authlocal3,
authlocal4, authlocal5, authlocal6, authlocal7, authlpr,
authmail, authnews, authsyslog, authuser, authuucp. ‘priority’
is one of emerg, alert, crit, err, warning, notice, info, debug.
FILES
Menu files: (Earlier listed directories override those listed later.)
~/.menu/*
Menu files added by the user. (Isn’t read if root runs
update-menus)
/etc/menu/*
Menu files added by the system administrator.
/usr/lib/menu/*
Architecture-dependant menu files provided by other
Debian packages.
/usr/share/menu/*
Architecture-independant menu files provided by other
Debian packages.
/usr/share/menu/default/*
Menu files provided by the menu package.
Menu methods:
/etc/menu-methods/
Executable configuration files that are added by window
managers and other menu programs, these files are run by
update-menus to generate menus for the different
programs. Also in this directory is the translate_menus
file, used for local configuration of the shape of the
menu trees.
~/.menu-methods/
For users to override the system-defaults of /etc/menu-
methods. If this directory exists, no files in
/etc/menu-methods are read any more.
DISTRIBUTION
Distribution is subject to the GNU General Public License.
BUGS
update-menus may not work properly when run by a normal user, to
generate menus for that user. This is usually because the window
manager doesn’t expect the system.${wm}rc files in the directory
(usually ~/.${wm}, configurable in /etc/menu-methods). If you see such
a thing, and you find a solution, please mail
<menu@packages.debian.org>. It should work OK for fvwm and fvwm2: I
usually test the package first as an ordinary user.
AUTHORS
Joost Witteveen <joostje@debian.org>, original idea by Lars Wirzenius
<liw@iki.fi>. Now maintained by Bill Allombert <ballombe@debian.org>.
THANKS
To Joey Hess, for a lot of good ideas and pre-release testing, and to
Tom Lees for a update-menus in pure C (of which I only used one
function, but that’s life).
Man page by Joey Hess, <joeyh@debian.org>
SEE ALSO
menufile(5), /usr/share/doc/menu/html