Re: FTypes on 6.0.1

[jmk3@crux3.cit.cornell.edu (Jay Krell)]

>Matt Deatherage once posted a method for people to get FTypes from a Mac and
>put it on their system.  Can someone tell me how this is done?
 
The filetype and creator are in the option list. I found some source that
catalogs a directory, printing files HFS creator and filetypes.
 
>Maybe I could design some icons and match them up with file types and put it
>all into one package...
 
You can, but not easily. Finder 6.0 supports rBundle resources which can match,
among many other things, Mac filetype and creators. However, the implementation
IMO is pretty lacking. rBundles are only handled automatically for
applications. When you launch an application, Finder checks for an rBundle and
copies it to a Desktop file. NDA's, control panels, inits, etc. have to make
calls to Finder to get it to see their rBundles and it looks like quite a pain.
Unless the docs are missing something, the "extension" has to find an
appropriate desktop file, creating one if necessary. Plus, these programs may
not be Finder extensions, but would have to become them in order to get their
rBundles recognized. In 6.0.1, doing a Get Info (err...Icon Info, nice
terminology) causes Finder to check a file for an rBundle, still _far_ from
automatic.
 
You cannot make icons for Mac filetypes with an old-style icon file.
 
(Since I'm all criticism, I should add that a low-overhead, fully
automatic method of recognizing rBundles isn't easy. The best I could think
of is defining a bit in the auxtype, but then again, a lot of auxtypes
are defined for all bits. This would at least help NDA's and the like.
Plus, maybe this auxtype bit on an old-filetype/style icon file could
indicate the file is actually rBundles, so people could make custom
rBundles.)

--
  --Jay, jay.krell@cornell.edu