how do I add another gnome apps directory ?

[djame <djame seddah loria fr>]

Hello,
I'm always compiling stuff by hand in /usr/local and in my $home/i386 
directory
I would like to be able to have the gnome apps installed here appeared 
in my start-menu
so I googled and I found that I had to modify 
/etc/gnome-vfs-2.0/vfolder/applications-all-users.vfolder.info

I add the following lines :

<!-- Merge in the GNOME1 menus if you build into a non-default prefix -->
(..)
<MergeDir>/usr/local/share/gnome/apps/</MergeDir>
<!-- Merge dirs optional -->
(..)
<MergeDir>/usr/local/share/applications/</MergeDir>

I'm  with gnome 2.4 on mandrake 9.2 and nothing  happenned...

what did I do wrong ?
and I wonder why if it exists some apps in order to modify the gnome 
component structure....



Djamé

ps : why the favorite entry menu has disappeared in the gnome start menu ?