5 ms·

xdg-override: change default application temporarily on Linux

132 points by koiueo 2y ago

TZubiri 2y ago
Who would win customxdgoverridebinary application .ext or just application file.ext Some people just really take any excuse to write a program.
- koiueo 2y ago
  I'm not sure I understand you... I can't change Slack source code to invoke `firefox $url` for me instead of xdg-open it currently invokes. If you know a way, please share.
  - TZubiri 2y ago
    How about just: 'firefox url' directly on the terminal?
    - rustyminnow 2y ago
      yes, lol, just copy the url, find/open a terminal window, type out `firefox `, paste the url, and press enter. So much easier. To be clear, the override script is closer to going ... mkdir ~/custombin/ ln $(which firefox) ~/custombin/xdg-open PATH=~/custombin:$PATH slack ... than going `firefox url`
nrabulinski 2y ago
I don’t understand those comments. I’ve been using sway for years, i3 before that and I’ve been using xdg-open since forever to open any file in the default application and I never felt it was confusing or I that I needed to replace it with something else. What am I missing?
- dmytrokow 2y ago
  You are missing a convenience of a desktop environment ;-) JK, i3 user here as well. The logic of xdg-open is straightforward. But once it's invoked from within a major DE, its behavior is sometimes not so obvious as it tries to delegate to a bunch of other tools.
bandie91 2y ago
joining to the "everyone reimplements a file-opener" team (shameless plug) : https://github.com/bAndie91/mimeopen-gui https://github.com/bAndie91/mimeopen-gui
bandie91 2y ago
IMO PATH-prepending is the right (unix-y) way to override certain commands, as OP does. but sadly, many projects, programms which I came across (mostly but not exclusively daemons), defines PATH for themself, not respecting inheritence: saying "what if someone set it up maliciously" or "default PATH is not enough / too wide / in wrong order / etc" ... man, sorry, process! what you inherit is what there is, it's your environment where you need to do your job. you can't? just fail and let the caller know the error case. will you (as an app author) change the CWD because it's unfamiliar (breaking relative path parameters along the way)? or redirect STDERR from a file to tty because "user MUST SEE this error" (making it NOT shown in the error log where the user did want to put the error output)? no. that's why you should not touch PATH. except if you are a logon process, a wrapper whose responsibility is to prepare the env for descendents, or crossing privilege boundary. due to this defiance of many programms, I started to switch from PATH-prepending to "over-mount executables in separate mount namespace" strategy. I hope it won't be voided by they invent "let's switch to the default namespace because it's my will" type of overreach.
sureglymop 2y ago
On gnome there is a GTK4 app called "Junction". It pops up a dialog that let's you choose what application to open the given content in. I highly recommend just aliasing 'open' to use that. https://apps.gnome.org/Junction/ https://apps.gnome.org/Junction/
- koiueo 2y ago
  Thanks for sharing this. I'm not on Gnome and don't need the option to choose an application every time I click on a link or a file. Nevertheless, seeing how other people approach a similar problem is interesting. Looking through the source code briefly, it seems like it's almost a full re-implementation of `xdg-open`. My solution is in a different league. I didn't mean to replace `xdg-open` and aimed to augment `xdg-open` while being as simple as possible.
  - sureglymop 2y ago
    Yours is really cool too! I'll definitely try it out :).
- vbernat 2y ago
  I have something similar with this short Python script: https://github.com/vincentbernat/i3wm-configuration/blob/master/bin/xdg-app-chooser https://github.com/vincentbernat/i3wm-configuration/blob/mas...
- LorenDB 2y ago
  That's just the GNOME xdg portal app, right? Other DEs like Plasma have their own versions of that as well.
arp242 2y ago
I just have a small shell script as "xdg-open". Writing this was easier than figuring out the magic xdg-* tools use the figure out the default application for something, and then not having that work on random days for reasons of planetary alignments. This is not that different from "xdg-override"; you can add global overrides for specific URLs with a simple match, and matches from a specific application by checking the parent process (e.g. $(readlink /proc/$PPID/exe) = /usr/bin/slack, or some such). It seems easier to me to have everything in one place. I also considered popping up dmenu for unknown filetypes, but I don't use it that much and don't really need it. At any rate, "to whom it might be useful": #!/bin/zsh # # xdg-open, without suckage. [ "${ZSH_VERSION:-}" = "" ] && echo >&2 "Only works with zsh" && exit 1 setopt err_exit no_unset pipefail (( $+1 )) || { print >&2 'need a parameter'; exit 1 } # Open URL. if [[ -z "${1:#*://*}" ]]; then proto=${(L)1%%://*} case $proto in (http|https) exec firefox $1 ;; (file) 1=${1##$proto://} # Remove protocol 1=/${1#*/} # Remove hostname ;; (*) print >&2 "xdg-open: no URL handler for protocol '$proto://' (for: $1)" exit 1 esac fi # Open file. ext=${(L)1:e} case $ext in (html|htm|pdf) exec firefox $1 ;; (png|webp|jpg|jpeg|heic) exec firefox $1 ;; (mp?|ogg|flac|m4v|mkv|avi|mov|wav) exec mpv $1 ;; (md|markdown|txt|sh|zsh|go|py|rb|js|c|json|xml) exec st -e vim $1 ;; (*) mime=$(file -b --mime $1 2>&/dev/null ||:) t=${mime%/*} case $t in (text) exec st -e vim $1 ;; (image) exec firefox $1 ;; (audio|video) exec mpv $1 ;; esac print >&2 "xdg-open: don't know how to open '.$ext' files (mime: '$mime') (for: $1)" exit 1 esac
- koiueo 2y ago
  In a sense, xdg-open does exactly what your script does. Only it reads associations from mimeapps.list. The complexity comes from the integration with various desktop environments. And this I understand. Ideally, everyone would use xdg-utils, but there's legacy, backward compatibility, what not. What I don't understand is why those DE-specific openers do not always respect xdg settings. For instance, kde-open would respect mineapps.list for almost everything except default browser. For me this is the main source of confusion and I would guess, this is the main driver behind numerous xdg-open alternatives out there.
fossdd 2y ago
That reminds my of a own xdg-open I wrote that sits in /usr/local/bin/xdg-open. It's a simple python script that checks by looking at the protocol, mime type or extension which URL it is and also asks if there are multiple applications https://paste.sr.ht/~fossdd/7fa65e10998ebcc03a2bbcc8488f94e91fd29c2d https://paste.sr.ht/~fossdd/7fa65e10998ebcc03a2bbcc8488f94e9... (CC0)
- jojo14 2y ago
  Thank you for sharing :-) Your script is simple, yet effective. If you plan to modify it you might want to check shlex : https://docs.python.org/3/library/shlex.html#module-shlex https://docs.python.org/3/library/shlex.html#module-shlex
- koiueo 2y ago
  I like the in_term trick
- JNRowe 2y ago
  [In the spirit of elucidation, and not general meanness…] Like jojo14 points out Python has the shlex module, and it is definitely useful in these situations even if just for quote(). And, os.system() is basically never safe with external input. Without proper escaping you're one click from code execution, for example with the input "file:///etc/issue%3Becho%20whoops" or "http://example.com/';echo http://example.com/';echo whoops'". It doesn't appear to matter in this instance, but you can feed check_output() with the stdin argument, which removes the need for using shell=True. shell=True in other paths could easily lead to unwanted code execution without thorough escaping.
Kudos 2y ago
My work VPN client doesn't work in Firefox, so I hacked something much more specific together to deal with that problem #!/bin/sh if [ "$@" = "/tmp/gpauth.html" ] then flatpak run --filesystem=/tmp/gpauth.html org.chromium.Chromium /tmp/gpauth.html else /usr/bin/xdg-open "$@" fi
- tjoff 2y ago
  I'm more worried why a VPN-client has anything to do with a browser?
  - chuckadams 2y ago
    Web login portal is my guess.
    - Kudos 2y ago
      Yeah, opens default browser for SSO auth.
M95D 2y ago
> Override xdg-open behavior. Because the way it already works is not confusing enough. Oh! YESSSSS!!! FINALLY!!! I've been removing x permissions for xdg-open for YEARS!!! I hope this works.
- koiueo 2y ago
  I hope you are not disappointed , but I suspect xdg-override might not be what you expected. xdg-override is not a replacement for xdg-open. It's a script, that selectively replaces xdg-open in narrow explicitly defined cases. But some xdg-open alternatives have been mentioned in the comments.
  - M95D 2y ago
    You're right. It's not what I hoped for.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
ThrowawayTestr 2y ago
Is this like the "open with" option in Windows?
- koiueo 2y ago
  I don't know how "open with" option on Windows works, but if it works like in other OSes (https://imgur.com/c26RLRv https://imgur.com/c26RLRv), then xdg-override is not about that. xdg-override temporarily and selectively replaces the application opened by default (without the "open with" menu and in places where this menu isn't even available)

132 points by koiueo 2y ago

Who would win customxdgoverridebinary application .ext or just application file.ext Some people just really take any excuse to write a program.

koiueo 2y ago
I'm not sure I understand you... I can't change Slack source code to invoke `firefox $url` for me instead of xdg-open it currently invokes. If you know a way, please share.
- TZubiri 2y ago
  How about just: 'firefox url' directly on the terminal?
  - rustyminnow 2y ago
    yes, lol, just copy the url, find/open a terminal window, type out `firefox `, paste the url, and press enter. So much easier. To be clear, the override script is closer to going ... mkdir ~/custombin/ ln $(which firefox) ~/custombin/xdg-open PATH=~/custombin:$PATH slack ... than going `firefox url`

nrabulinski 2y ago

I don’t understand those comments. I’ve been using sway for years, i3 before that and I’ve been using xdg-open since forever to open any file in the default application and I never felt it was confusing or I that I needed to replace it with something else. What am I missing?

dmytrokow 2y ago
You are missing a convenience of a desktop environment ;-) JK, i3 user here as well. The logic of xdg-open is straightforward. But once it's invoked from within a major DE, its behavior is sometimes not so obvious as it tries to delegate to a bunch of other tools.

bandie91 2y ago

joining to the "everyone reimplements a file-opener" team (shameless plug) : https://github.com/bAndie91/mimeopen-gui https://github.com/bAndie91/mimeopen-gui

bandie91 2y ago

IMO PATH-prepending is the right (unix-y) way to override certain commands, as OP does. but sadly, many projects, programms which I came across (mostly but not exclusively daemons), defines PATH for themself, not respecting inheritence: saying "what if someone set it up maliciously" or "default PATH is not enough / too wide / in wrong order / etc" ... man, sorry, process! what you inherit is what there is, it's your environment where you need to do your job. you can't? just fail and let the caller know the error case. will you (as an app author) change the CWD because it's unfamiliar (breaking relative path parameters along the way)? or redirect STDERR from a file to tty because "user MUST SEE this error" (making it NOT shown in the error log where the user did want to put the error output)? no. that's why you should not touch PATH. except if you are a logon process, a wrapper whose responsibility is to prepare the env for descendents, or crossing privilege boundary. due to this defiance of many programms, I started to switch from PATH-prepending to "over-mount executables in separate mount namespace" strategy. I hope it won't be voided by they invent "let's switch to the default namespace because it's my will" type of overreach.

sureglymop 2y ago

On gnome there is a GTK4 app called "Junction". It pops up a dialog that let's you choose what application to open the given content in. I highly recommend just aliasing 'open' to use that. https://apps.gnome.org/Junction/ https://apps.gnome.org/Junction/

koiueo 2y ago
Thanks for sharing this. I'm not on Gnome and don't need the option to choose an application every time I click on a link or a file. Nevertheless, seeing how other people approach a similar problem is interesting. Looking through the source code briefly, it seems like it's almost a full re-implementation of `xdg-open`. My solution is in a different league. I didn't mean to replace `xdg-open` and aimed to augment `xdg-open` while being as simple as possible.
- sureglymop 2y ago
  Yours is really cool too! I'll definitely try it out :).
vbernat 2y ago
I have something similar with this short Python script: https://github.com/vincentbernat/i3wm-configuration/blob/master/bin/xdg-app-chooser https://github.com/vincentbernat/i3wm-configuration/blob/mas...
LorenDB 2y ago
That's just the GNOME xdg portal app, right? Other DEs like Plasma have their own versions of that as well.

arp242 2y ago

I just have a small shell script as "xdg-open". Writing this was easier than figuring out the magic xdg-* tools use the figure out the default application for something, and then not having that work on random days for reasons of planetary alignments. This is not that different from "xdg-override"; you can add global overrides for specific URLs with a simple match, and matches from a specific application by checking the parent process (e.g. $(readlink /proc/$PPID/exe) = /usr/bin/slack, or some such). It seems easier to me to have everything in one place. I also considered popping up dmenu for unknown filetypes, but I don't use it that much and don't really need it. At any rate, "to whom it might be useful": #!/bin/zsh # # xdg-open, without suckage. [ "${ZSH_VERSION:-}" = "" ] && echo >&2 "Only works with zsh" && exit 1 setopt err_exit no_unset pipefail (( $+1 )) || { print >&2 'need a parameter'; exit 1 } # Open URL. if [[ -z "${1:#*://*}" ]]; then proto=${(L)1%%://*} case $proto in (http|https) exec firefox $1 ;; (file) 1=${1##$proto://} # Remove protocol 1=/${1#*/} # Remove hostname ;; (*) print >&2 "xdg-open: no URL handler for protocol '$proto://' (for: $1)" exit 1 esac fi # Open file. ext=${(L)1:e} case $ext in (html|htm|pdf) exec firefox $1 ;; (png|webp|jpg|jpeg|heic) exec firefox $1 ;; (mp?|ogg|flac|m4v|mkv|avi|mov|wav) exec mpv $1 ;; (md|markdown|txt|sh|zsh|go|py|rb|js|c|json|xml) exec st -e vim $1 ;; (*) mime=$(file -b --mime $1 2>&/dev/null ||:) t=${mime%/*} case $t in (text) exec st -e vim $1 ;; (image) exec firefox $1 ;; (audio|video) exec mpv $1 ;; esac print >&2 "xdg-open: don't know how to open '.$ext' files (mime: '$mime') (for: $1)" exit 1 esac

koiueo 2y ago
In a sense, xdg-open does exactly what your script does. Only it reads associations from mimeapps.list. The complexity comes from the integration with various desktop environments. And this I understand. Ideally, everyone would use xdg-utils, but there's legacy, backward compatibility, what not. What I don't understand is why those DE-specific openers do not always respect xdg settings. For instance, kde-open would respect mineapps.list for almost everything except default browser. For me this is the main source of confusion and I would guess, this is the main driver behind numerous xdg-open alternatives out there.

fossdd 2y ago

That reminds my of a own xdg-open I wrote that sits in /usr/local/bin/xdg-open. It's a simple python script that checks by looking at the protocol, mime type or extension which URL it is and also asks if there are multiple applications https://paste.sr.ht/~fossdd/7fa65e10998ebcc03a2bbcc8488f94e91fd29c2d https://paste.sr.ht/~fossdd/7fa65e10998ebcc03a2bbcc8488f94e9... (CC0)

jojo14 2y ago
Thank you for sharing :-) Your script is simple, yet effective. If you plan to modify it you might want to check shlex : https://docs.python.org/3/library/shlex.html#module-shlex https://docs.python.org/3/library/shlex.html#module-shlex
koiueo 2y ago
I like the in_term trick
JNRowe 2y ago
[In the spirit of elucidation, and not general meanness…] Like jojo14 points out Python has the shlex module, and it is definitely useful in these situations even if just for quote(). And, os.system() is basically never safe with external input. Without proper escaping you're one click from code execution, for example with the input "file:///etc/issue%3Becho%20whoops" or "http://example.com/';echo http://example.com/';echo whoops'". It doesn't appear to matter in this instance, but you can feed check_output() with the stdin argument, which removes the need for using shell=True. shell=True in other paths could easily lead to unwanted code execution without thorough escaping.

Kudos 2y ago

My work VPN client doesn't work in Firefox, so I hacked something much more specific together to deal with that problem #!/bin/sh if [ "$@" = "/tmp/gpauth.html" ] then flatpak run --filesystem=/tmp/gpauth.html org.chromium.Chromium /tmp/gpauth.html else /usr/bin/xdg-open "$@" fi

tjoff 2y ago
I'm more worried why a VPN-client has anything to do with a browser?
- chuckadams 2y ago
  Web login portal is my guess.
  - Kudos 2y ago
    Yeah, opens default browser for SSO auth.

M95D 2y ago

> Override xdg-open behavior. Because the way it already works is not confusing enough. Oh! YESSSSS!!! FINALLY!!! I've been removing x permissions for xdg-open for YEARS!!! I hope this works.

koiueo 2y ago
I hope you are not disappointed , but I suspect xdg-override might not be what you expected. xdg-override is not a replacement for xdg-open. It's a script, that selectively replaces xdg-open in narrow explicitly defined cases. But some xdg-open alternatives have been mentioned in the comments.
- M95D 2y ago
  You're right. It's not what I hoped for.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

ThrowawayTestr 2y ago

Is this like the "open with" option in Windows?

koiueo 2y ago
I don't know how "open with" option on Windows works, but if it works like in other OSes (https://imgur.com/c26RLRv https://imgur.com/c26RLRv), then xdg-override is not about that. xdg-override temporarily and selectively replaces the application opened by default (without the "open with" menu and in places where this menu isn't even available)