I've been using Linux on the desktop for more than 25 years now. While I don't put icons on my desktop any longer (and haven't for probably around 15 years), I do use the gnome-shell launcher to quickly open programs, and this utilizes desktop files.

Recently, I wanted to create launchers for different Obsidian vaults. Obsidian provides a URL schema for this: obsidian://open?vault=VaultName. The application registers the schema handler with the system, so this should open, but evidently you can no longer use "Type=Link" in your desktop files.

What I found:

• You MUST have a "Version=1.0" line; gnome-shell just ignored any of my desktop files that omitted it.
• You can use xdg-open in your Exec line to open the URL.

[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Name=Notes
Icon=/usr/share/icons/hicolor/256x256/apps/obsidian.png
Comment=My Obsidian vault for notes
Categories=Office;ProjectManagement;
Type=Application
Exec=xdg-open "obsidian://open?vault=notes"