Bug 500734

Summary:	Application Dashboard: Disambiguate same app installed from different sources
Product:	[Plasma] plasmashell	Reporter:	Nate Graham <nate>
Component:	Application Dashboard widget	Assignee:	Marco Martin <notmart>
Status:	CONFIRMED ---
Severity:	wishlist	CC:	bad63r, carlosd.kde, niccolo
Priority:	NOR	Keywords:	usability
Version First Reported In:	6.3.0
Target Milestone:	1.0
Platform:	Other
OS:	Linux
Latest Commit:		Version Fixed In:
Sentry Crash Report:
Bug Depends on:
Bug Blocks:	499065

Description Nate Graham 2025-02-25 16:04:39 UTC

If you install the same app from different sources (i.e. Flatpak and distro packages) then they can appear identical in Application Dashboard.

As long as both have the same AppStream ID, we can teach Application Dashboard to know they're the same app and visually disambiguate them somehow.

Comment 1 Tom 2025-03-13 16:21:43 UTC

Hi, I figured it out. I am distinguishing apps by their <APP_NAME>.desktop file location. There are several paths for .desktop files. 
1. /usr/share/applications or /usr/local/share/applications/ --> all apps installed with official distro repository 
2. ~/.local/share/applications/ --> user-specific applications
3. /var/lib/flatpak/ (by default) or any other specified path during installation I think --> flatpak , whole .desktop path must contain flatpak substring
4. /var/lib/snapd/desktop (by default or any other specified path during installation I think) --> snaps 

Should we have some special unified mark if app is not installed by default "official" way or should we have dedicated mark for each app installed from different sources(1-4 mentioned above) ? 

Here is an example how it look like for "native" distro Firefox and Firefox installed with Flatpak: https://i.imgur.com/VnldTFW.png

p.s. This is solution by looking at  .desktop file path, I think we can also distinguish apps by executable command in .desktop files it proposed solution is not correct.

Comment 2 Carlos De Maine 2025-04-08 09:00:38 UTC

this looks good. do you have a poc or is this just an (very good) analysis so far??

Comment 3 Niccolò Venerandi 2025-10-02 14:14:56 UTC

Do other launchers do this? Why do we want this specifically in the dashboard?

Comment 4 Nate Graham 2025-10-02 14:40:56 UTC

This is the bug report that tracks doing it in the dashboard, since each launcher needs an implementation of the feature. Check out the metabug in the "Blocks" field.