# The panel

How do I add applications to the &kde; panel (&kicker;)?

There are several ways to add an application to the panel, of which the easiest is to right-click on the panel, and from the context menu which appears, select Panel Menu Add to Panel Application Button and then the application for which you want to add a link.

For more ways of adding buttons to the panel, refer to the &kicker; Handbook.

Is it possible to change the K button of the panel to another picture?

The simplest way is to download a new icon theme with a &kmenu; icon you prefer from http://www.kde-look.org and install it using the &kcontrolcenter;.

In order to change only the &kmenu; icon you can overwrite the `kmenu.png` image for every size in an icon theme set. So, for &kde; default icons this would be `$`KDEDIR`/share/icons/default.kde/size/apps/kmenu.png`, where size is one of the sizes included in the &kde; icon theme.

My desktop panel has disappeared. How can I get it back?

The panel disappearing is usually due to it crashing. This is most often caused by loading an applet that has a fatal bug or due to a bad installation of &kde; and/or the panel.

The easiest way to get the panel back is to launch the Run Command window by pressing &Alt;F2 and entering ``kicker`` and then pressing the OK button.

If the panel continues to disappear, you may wish to either remove or edit by hand your `$`KDEHOME`/share/config/kickerrc` file, where `$`KDEHOME`` is usually `~/.kde`. If you choose to edit it by hand, start by removing the applet entry groups.