Desktop shortcut
A desktop shortcut starts RigReady for one setup: it makes the rig ready and launches the game, or only makes the rig ready for a setup that launches nothing.
Making one
Open Configure > Setups, choose Edit on the setup, and find the Desktop shortcut panel under the Launch section. It says whether a shortcut is on the desktop.
Create desktop shortcut shows what will change on the desktop first, with the file that will be written, and asks Put a shortcut for "DCS F/A-18C" on the desktop?. After Create shortcut, RigReady writes the file, reads it back, and reports it as made only when the file is there and starts this RigReady with this setup: "On the desktop: DCS F-A-18C - RigReady.lnk".
The panel waits for a save when the setup's name or what it launches has changed, because the shortcut takes both from the saved setup.
The file
The shortcut is <setup name> - RigReady.lnk in your Desktop folder. Characters a file name cannot hold (/ \ : * ? " < > |) become dashes, so "DCS F/A-18C" gives "DCS F-A-18C - RigReady.lnk". It starts RigReady.exe --launch=<setup id> (or --make-ready=<setup id> for a setup that launches nothing), with RigReady's folder as the working folder and RigReady's icon. The setup's id, not its name, is in the shortcut, so renaming the setup does not break it.
Writing the shortcut is a change outside RigReady's own folder, so it goes through the Safety page like every such change: it is listed there and can be undone (Protect).
What a double-click does
RigReady starts (or the RigReady already running is handed the command), its window comes forward, the setup is checked, every fix runs, and the game is launched only when every required check is met. If something is missing, nothing is launched and the window says what. A monitor change asks to be kept. See Starting without the window.
When the shortcut is out of date
The panel reads the shortcut each time and says what is wrong:
- The setup was renamed: the old shortcut is found under its earlier name. Update shortcut writes the new one and removes the old.
- The setup now launches something, or no longer does: the shortcut asks for the wrong thing. Update shortcut rewrites it.
- The shortcut starts another copy of RigReady (an earlier install in another folder): Update shortcut points it at this one.
- Another file has the name and is not a shortcut to this setup: the panel says so and offers Replace it with the shortcut.
Removing it
Remove shortcut shows what will be removed, then removes the shortcut (and one left under an earlier name). The setup itself is not touched.
Deleting the setup on the Setups page removes its shortcut too, in the same action, so one Undo on the Safety page brings the setup and its shortcut back together (Clone, copy and delete). Uninstalling RigReady removes every setup shortcut on the desktop (Uninstall). A shortcut to a setup whose file was removed by hand opens RigReady with "There is no setup ..." and the names of the setups on this PC.