Zorin Taskbar Problem

General Help
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I am running Zorin 18 Pro on a gaming desktop that I use for simulations. I am a physics student. I installed Maplesofts Maple Mathematics program. My desktop was all set up properly when I made some mistakes and had to restore it. My Maple icon was gone. I managed to get it in the taskbar, but a gear icon appears at the same time. If I right click on the gear icon there is no option to either pin or unpin it. The program works as it should. I would like to just get rid of the gear icon that appears with the opening of the program. If this is too complicated, I can just leave as is. Thank you to anyone who can offer some assistance.

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Maybe this can help you:

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Quick Fix 1: Unpin and Re-pin Correctly

  1. Right-click the gear icon → Select "Quit" or close Maple completely

  2. Right-click the Maple icon (the proper one) → "Unpin" to remove it from taskbar

  3. Open Maple from the applications menu (Zorin Start button)

  4. Right-click on the gear icon that appears when Maple launches → "Pin to Dash" (this pins the actual running process)

  5. If it shows the gear permanently after pinning, right-click it → "Edit" and manually select the Maple icon

Fix 2: Edit the Desktop Entry (Most Likely Solution)

The .desktop file likely has a mismatched StartupWMClass:

  1. Find Maple's desktop file:

bash

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find /usr/share/applications ~/.local/share/applications -name "*maple*" -o -name "*Maple*"
  1. Open it (replace path with what you found):

bash

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nano ~/.local/share/applications/maple.desktop
  1. Look for the line StartupWMClass=. If it's missing or wrong, add/fix it:

ini

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StartupWMClass=maple

OR try:

ini

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StartupWMClass=com-maplesoft-maple-Maple
  1. Save (Ctrl+X, Y, Enter) and restart GNOME Shell (Alt+F2, r)

Fix 3: Identify the Correct Window Class

If you're not sure what to put in StartupWMClass:

  1. Open Maple

  2. Open terminal and run:

bash

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xprop WM_CLASS

  1. Click on the Maple window (the gear icon window)

  2. It will output something like: WM_CLASS(STRING) = "maple", "Maple"

  3. Use the second name (exactly as shown, case-sensitive) in the StartupWMClass= line from Fix 2

Fix 4: Fix the Icon Path

If the gear appears because the icon file is missing:

  1. In the .desktop file, find the line: Icon=

  2. Change it to an absolute path or standard icon name:

ini

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Icon=/opt/maple2023/bin/Maple.ico

Or download a Maple PNG icon and point to it:

ini

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Icon=/home/YOURNAME/.local/share/icons/maple.png

Nuclear Option: Remove the Duplicate

If you just want the gear gone and don't care about the "proper" icon:

  1. Right-click the Maple icon (the one you added manually) → Unpin

  2. Keep the gear icon pinned (it's the actual working process)

  3. Right-click gear → Edit → give it a custom name "Maple" and select a nice icon

Most likely to work: Fix 2 or 3. Maple is notorious on Linux for having weird window class names that don't match its launcher.

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Please mark any sections of your posts that were created by AI. Thanks!

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