Help me understand the exec entry in emacsclient.desktop

Help me understand the exec entry in emacsclient.desktop

[Alexandros Prekates]

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That is the entry:

Exec=sh -c "if [ -n \\"\\$*\\" ]; then exec emacsclient
--alternate-editor= --display=\\"\\$DISPLAY\\" \\"\\$@\\"; else exec
emacsclient --alternate-editor= --create-frame; fi"

My interpretation so far is: If files where given as arguments then
start in a certain display and use the current opened frame .
If files were not given then create a new frame.
But it doesnt make much sense to me. Also why  sh %F and not %F ?
And why in the latter case display is not being set ?

Alexandros.

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Re: Help me understand the exec entry in emacsclient.desktop

[Mekeor Melire]

I recently started a discussion on emacsclient.desktop's Exec entry
here: https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=67736

To precisely answer your question, the current Exec line does this:

emacsclient.desktop start emacsclient, and if there's no daemon running,
it'll start one. This is what --alternate-editor= is for. Additionally:

If emacsclient.desktop is applied on one or more files, then it'll try
to reuse one of the frames, if I understand correctly.

Otherwise, i.e. if you're invoking emacsclient.desktop without any files
passed to it, e.g. by clicking its icon in your app-launcher, it'll
create a frame.

For me, personally, the Exec entry does not work but fails with an error
related to quoting. Please share your experience in the mentioned
bug-report.