[Pythonmac-SIG] associating file types and applications...

[Jack Jansen]

On 31 Mar 2004, at 22:11, Tom Pollard wrote:

>
> On Mar 31, 2004, at 1:48 PM, Daniel Greenblatt wrote:
>> Thanks for the quick response Bob, I'm not sure this solves my problem
>> though (looking at my original email, I see it can be taken several
>> ways)...
>>
>> My understanding that although the Info.plist file informs the OS of 
>> what
>> type of files a particular application bundle knows how to handle, it
>> doesnt necessarily tell the OS that it should use that particular
>> application when a file of that type is encountered....
>
> The default app to use when opening a document is a property of the 
> Finder.  Users can always reassign particular document types to the 
> app of their choosing using the Info window.  So, I'm not sure it 
> would be considered "playing nice" to override that preference for an 
> existing filetype.  I imagine if you introduce a new filetype, your 
> app will automatically be the default app for opening those files.  
> That's just my impression of how things work - I'm not an expert.

There *is* a way to do this, though: the various media players 
(quicktime, itunes, realplayer, windows media) all offer to handle all 
your mp3s and other types for you, and if you say "yes" they do it (at 
least until you override again from the finder).

I'm not sure whether they do this through AppleEvents to the Finder, 
AppleEvents to something else or a completely different mechanism, 
though.
--
Jack Jansen, <Jack.Jansen at cwi.nl>, http://www.cwi.nl/~jack
If I can't dance I don't want to be part of your revolution -- Emma 
Goldman