Proposal for associating file extensions with cygwin programs

[Dave <kilroyd at googlemail dot com>]

As I stated here:

http://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2006-02/msg00591.html

In response to a few requests (two that I am aware of):
http://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2006-02/msg00533.html
http://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2005-11/msg00738.html

and my original proposal:
http://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin-apps/2005-11/msg00274.html

I've done a little work on a script and small application allowing users 
to set up some explorer integration for cygwin applications, using 
script fragments that would be installed with the packages (and 
maintained by the application package maintainers).

I'm looking for feedback on what I've done so far. Eventually I'll 
either ITP this as a new package, or merge the functionality with chere. 
(Or if no interest, just drop it entirely). Everything works for me as 
it stands (W2K Prof).

Details below for those who are interested.


Dave.


Source and examples available at:
http://www.virtualsoup.org/files/sentry-0.1-1.tar.bz2

* Instructions
1. Extract somewhere
2. Run configure and make (package isn't autoconfed, but should behave 
well enough). Note the standard cygwin make 3.80 won't succeed. It needs 
3.81 or the patch at 
http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?func=detailitem&item_id=1517
3. Do make install, or just place sentry.exe in your path.
4. Play with the xpintegrate script (in whereever you extracted things to)

* Details

The xpintegrate script is like the chere script. It is modular and does 
not contain the specific code for shell/terminal stuff. It is intended 
to setup handlers for particular file extensions as defined by shell 
fragments (in the examples directory). Use the -h option to get help. 
Before having the script do anything (-i/-u), please use the -p option 
and check what it will do to the registry.

Starting cygwin programs requires that any file arguments are POSIX 
style, and that the environment is setup as from a login shell. This 
could be done by starting a login shell for each program and running a 
script to convert the filenames. After investigating it seems more 
efficient to have a common login shell spawn subsequent programs.

sentry.exe is a mingw tray icon application. Upon startup it starts a 
login shell (default ash) with stdin, stdout and stderr redirected to 
pipes controlled by sentry.exe.

Each subsequent instance of sentry.exe passes its command line arguments 
to the original instance and exits.

The original instance parses the command line arguments and executes 
them in the login shell. It optionally passes certain arguments through 
cygpath.

When started right-clicking the cygwin icon and selecting Console will 
let you see the commands being executed, and any command output (or errors).

** Known issues
- if bash is used as the login shell a command isn't executed until 
another command is received. 
http://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2006-04/msg00980.html

* Shell fragments

The shell fragments which define how to setup things for a given 
application have the extension .xpi. I've included whatever I thought 
might be useful, but only a some of the information is used at the 
moment to setup the context menus.

Suggestions on other infomation to put there welcome.

** Examples

I've put together examples to associate .txt files with notepad, .exe 
files with insight, and Drives/Directories with a login and non-login 
rxvt/bash.

The bash examples are merely to show that it can be done, and to 
highlight any differences in environment. I'm not sure whether we should 
use this mechanism to subsume chere functionality. It's messy enough as 
it is.

I don't use the xserver, but it should be simple enough to set up .xpi 
files for any X program.

WARNING: Avoid associating an app with .exe. I did this with my first 
attempt for insight. It breaks Start...run (and who knows what else). 
Associate with exefile instead. I need to verify that using exefile 
works on all windows versions though.


* TODO
 - Decide where to put .xpi files
 - Add ability to copy text from console dialog
 - Read login shell to use settings from /etc/passwd by default
 - Add a properties dialog to allow the user to specify that sentry use 
a particular login shell.
 - ... other options???

* License
The code is GPL'ed.