Wonder if rofi would suit your needs?
this post was submitted on 31 Jul 2025
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I saw that while looking but isn't it just another way to search? I want to limit what can be sin just have a few specific games
if you have a specific list, and are willing to manually configure this launcher, rofi is the way to go, as it is fully scriptable
Ahh I may have misunderstood sounds like you're trying to "pin" applications to be launched. This is more app launcher than dock.
I want a dock/panel that goes away and pops up based on a shortcut, like slides on screen or pops up on top, rofis prob the move, like ddterm but for games
Rofi is certainly a great choice, though it relies on scripts to customize it to your needs. These scripts can be anywhere from extremely basic to insanely complex but you have to create them.
Personaly I use it as:
- an app launcher
- a clipboard manager
- an infobar to show things like the date/time, memory usage, disk space, battery level, wifi signal…
- an omnibar to perform an internet search, quick units conversions
- a calculator for simple math
- a bookmark manager (list, open, edit, add, remove)
- a password/2FA token manager (list, edit, add, remove, autofill internet fields)
- a wifi manager
- a vpn manager
Oh I'll definitely look into that, sounds fun to setup
https://github.com/kando-menu/kando
This should be what you are looking for? Has controller support.
That's great and definitely more on par with what I was looking for, thank you!
I've used Ulauncher in the past, it looks nice and it's launched with a keybinding, but I don't know if you can configure it to only include certain apps since I don't use it anymore.
That seems useful in general, but kando was more what I was looking fot
Maybe you could configure KRunner to work for what you want? I'm not sure though. Haven't used it enough myself
Can't you just create a folder with links / shortcuts to all the applications and games and just open said folder with a click (or some kind of shortcut)?
Exactly! I harbor nostalgia for the old Windows 3 desktop icon grid, so I open a file manager window pointing to ~/Desktop and display the *.desktop shortcuts there as icons. This is done automatically when gdm starts. My file manager is PCManFM, which is a rip-off of nautilus. Double-clicking on an icon opens the shortcut — be it to a terminal or a graphical application. I have to alt-tab to the PCManFM window of course, so I need the keyboard. Then I have to double-click with the mouse. It’s keeping both hemispheres of the brain active: subject/verb, left/right. Presumably you can map your game controller's buttons to keyboard equivalents like , , and (or map your game controller's buttons to PCManFM's hot key config), which would allow you to navigate the PCManFM icon grid.
I assumed someone would've made something that looks nice lol