An Applet I Read About Is Not on My Launchpad. Why?
If you are asking “An applet I read about is not on my launchpad — why?”, the answer is that nothing is broken: your launchpad shows only what has been installed on your login, and a colleague’s shows only theirs. This guide explains where the launchpad’s contents come from, how to build a view of the five applets you actually use, and the layout every applet shares, across three pages: this one, Launchpad Views and Inside an Applet. Ten minutes here means the twentieth applet you open feels like the first.
Meet GadgetSphere
You have just been given a login at GadgetSphere Sdn Bhd. Your job is accounts receivable, so you need four or five applets out of the dozens the company runs, and you want them one click away. Your colleague in the Penang branch GS-PEN-01 handles stock, and his launchpad looks nothing like yours. By the end of this page you will know why, and what to ask for when you need one of his applets.
Your launchpad, at a glance
- Search from HOME. The search box covers only the view you are on.
- Build a view of the applets you use: press + beside the view buttons, name it, add the applets and press Save (Launchpad views).
- Make it your default: press and hold its button, then choose Make as default (Launchpad views).
- Change a view from the sidebar’s Menu Set list. While a menu set is being edited, the cross on a launchpad tile uninstalls the applet; the cross in the sidebar list only takes it out of the view (Launchpad views).
- Missing an applet? Look in the Applet Store. Your launchpad shows only what is installed on your login (When an applet is not there).
The launchpad is home
When you sign in you land on the launchpad: one tile for each applet installed on your login. The launchpad is built fresh at each sign-in from two things:
- Your installs. Every applet installed on your login, whichever tenant it belongs to. One install is one tile. The applets a tenant owns do not appear by themselves, and neither does an applet you only hold a permission for.
- One Applet Store tile, chosen by the web address you signed in at. It is the one tile you did not install, and it appears in every view.
So the honest answer to “why can my colleague see it and I cannot?” is usually “it is installed on his login and not on yours”. Nothing about your company or branch decides it.
Three things on each tile are worth knowing:
- The tenant badge is the tenant whose catalogue gave you that install. If your login reaches more than one tenant, this is how you tell two copies of the same applet apart. Platform-level applets are badged platform.
- The number badge is the total of the notifications recorded against your install of that applet. It is kept per install, so a colleague’s tile for the same applet can show a different number.
- The order of the tiles is the order the server returns them in. You can’t sort the grid or drag it into another order, so use a view to control what you see first.
Above the grid is a search box that matches applet name or tenant name, but it searches only the view you are on. If you have made a five-applet view your default and search for an applet outside it, the result is empty. Switch to HOME first, and the search covers everything installed on your login.
When an applet is not there
A missing tile means one of two things, and you can tell them apart in the Applet Store:
- It is in the store for you, but not installed. You find it under Public or Private in the Applet Store. Install it yourself, and it is a tile on your launchpad from then on.
- It is not in the store for you at all. A private catalogue reaches you only because your tenant’s Owner or Admin linked your login to it in Tenant Admin. Ask them. They can link you to the catalogue, or install the applet for you directly from Catalogue › Applet › Installed By User. If they cannot find it either, ask BigLedger.
An install puts a tile on your launchpad and grants nothing. What you can see and do inside the applet comes from the role or permission you hold, which is a separate record. So two failures look different. With an install and no permission, the tile opens to empty or refused listings. With a permission and no install, you have no tile at all. When your Owner grants you something new, reload the applet; you don’t need to sign out. The applet asks for its permissions once, as it opens.
At GadgetSphere, suppose you need the stock balance report your Penang colleague uses. Ask the Owner for two things together: the install, and a role that covers the branches you report on.
Deciding who gets which applets is a job for the tenant’s Owner or Admin, not something the launchpad decides. Do it per job, not per person: one role for the AR job, with the same four applets installed for everyone who holds it. They know it worked when the new person reloads, sees the tiles, and the listings show rows. When someone leaves, the order matters: remove the role first, then uninstall. The Tenant Admin page walks through both.
Menu entries or buttons missing inside an applet are a different matter: most of those depend on a permission or a setting. A greyed-out button is usually waiting on data. A button that is not there at all usually needs a permission.
What the launchpad connects to
| Relationship | What it means for you | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Upstream | Before a tile can exist, three things must be in place. The applet must be live in the platform’s register. A catalogue must offer it to your login. It must then be installed on your login, by you or by your Owner or Admin. Roles and permissions are set up separately, by the same people | Applet Store, Tenant Admin, Teams and permissions |
| Downstream | The launchpad is only a door. A missing tile stops you, not the work: documents your colleagues raise in that applet post exactly as before. Uninstalling takes away your door, not your permission | Getting started |
| Sibling | The sidebar’s Menu Set holds the same records as your views, with folders. Use views for a quick shortlist and the sidebar when you want folders. Personalization inside an applet is a different personal layer, kept for that one applet | Settings and permissions |
| Blast radius | Your views, your default and your installs affect your login only, but whichever tenant you are working in. An applet’s Settings affect everyone in the tenant, across all three GadgetSphere companies | This page, Settings and permissions |
| Pairing | An install and a role go together. Ask for both in the same request, and build a view once both have arrived | Tenant Admin |
What success looks like
Five minutes, and you are set up for good:
- Build a view containing the four or five applets you use daily. Press and hold its button and choose Make as default. The button now reads (Default).
- Sign out and back in. You land on that view.
- Switch to HOME, search for an applet that is not in your view, and open it from the results.
- Inside one applet, open Advanced Search, widen the date range, and find a record the default filter was hiding.
Common mistakes
| What goes wrong | What you see | The fix |
|---|---|---|
| Searching from inside a view | The launchpad search finds nothing for an applet you know you have | The search covers only the view you are on. Switch to HOME and search again |
| Assuming a missing applet is a bug, or a company setting | Confusion, and a support ticket | It is not installed on your login. Install it from the Applet Store, or ask your Owner or Admin for the install and the role |
The mistakes that belong to one part are on that part’s page: removing a tile with the cross on the launchpad, arranging the view buttons by dragging and looking for Make as default on Launchpad Views; a document that has “disappeared”, changing a Setting meaning to change it for yourself and copying grid data by hand on Inside an Applet.