Starting Applications in Ubuntu on Log In
This morning I realized the first thing I do almost all the time when I log in to the laptop is open Firefox. I don’t do this on the desktop because I tend to do other work there. But on the laptop, it’s almost always checking mail or some other web browsing. In the past, I’ve set this up and always undid it, as frequently, this wasn’t what I logged in for and, in the past, waiting for the browser to load was an annoyance. However, machines are faster now and (on the laptop, at least) I’m spending more of my computer time on line. So let’s give it a shot again.
I hunted through the System -> Preferences menu and found Startup Applications. On the second tab, “Options”, there’s a button labeled “Remember Currently Running Application”. I pressed it, logged out and logged back in. No Firefox.
I don’t know why this didn’t work, and given that, I don’t know what that button’s supposed to do, but it appears that you’re supposed to add the application to the first tab “Startup Programs”. I added Firefox (/usr/bin/firefox). It was selected by default. Log out and log in, et viola, a browser window.