Default programs for launching a specific type of file can be configured in windows. For example, double clicking a .doc file will open that file in Word, but you can reconfigured the default program associated with the .doc extension to launch the file in any program you want.
My question is, can you set the 'default program' to be a web app, or a URL? I have a web app that exports files that can then be re-imported into the web app. I want to be able to double click on those files and have a browser window open that automatically imports that file into the web app.
Yes you can.
There is a registry entry that maps an extension to a file type. There are registry entries for the file type indicating "verbs" that can be performed for that file type. One of those entries for the verb will indicate a command line, and the command line is completely arbitrary. As long as you can specify a URL in the command line to the browser, you can make the browser open anything you want.
Here's a Microsoft reference to get you started: Verbs and File Associations
Related
I have an application that can "serialize" its state as a folder with images. This folder is called, e.g., C:\Temp\MyProject.ImageExplorer and the FileSystem consists of :
C:\Temp\MyProject.ImageExplorer\Pic1.jpeg
C:\Temp\MyProject.ImageExplorer\Pic2.jpeg
...
Can I Configure Windows Explorer in a way, that a Double Click on a folder with my .ImageExplorer "extension" does not open the folder but starts my ImageExplorer.exe with the folder name as command line argument?
Can I modify the C# .Net OpenFile Selector in a way to open these "Folders" including the Filter by extension ?
You can do it but might have issues since the file type is a folder. What I would do is basically make it a uncompressed .ZIP file, You can change the extension to what ever you want so you can associate it with your application like .IZP
You can make your application setup a registry key that associates .IZP with your application and pass the path to the file in as parameter to program.exe path/to/izp/that/user/opened
You might just have to adjust the program to handle reading a container rather than a folder.
I've implemented a user mode program and a Windows file system minifilter that creates a skeleton view of users files for a remote file storage system. It maps the remote files to the local drive. The user mode program creates a reparse tag for each file on the remote system. When a create request (e.g., CreateFile for read) is detected, the minifilter asks the user mode program to download the file. This should only happen when a program wants to open the file for viewing or editing.
But, I'm finding that Windows Explorer is triggering my files to download. I'd like to prevent the Explorer File windows and File Open/Save dialogs from
triggering downloads. And, I also want to display the file thumbnails and file
size.
[Update: I've found I can use Windows sparse files to show my remote
file size in Explorer. ]
Therefore, I have also implemented a Shell Extension, IThumbnailProvider, that downloads a rendition of the file. This provides the file thumbnails.
For my testing, I've registered the IThumbnailProvider for all files (*) and for .jpg files.
I'm seeing two interesting behaviors using a combination of Process Monitor and DebugView (both from SysInternals):
1. If I make my minifilter reject requests to open the file from Explorer, then my IThumbnailProvider is invoked.
2. If I permit open requests from Explorer, I see thumbcache.dll in the call stack trying to open the file and my IThumbnailProvider is not called. It appears that the default thumbnail provider reads the downloaded file and creates the thumbnail.
I must be missing something.
Update: if I use InitializeWithStream instead of InitializeWithFile, it appears my handler is invoked. But, that also triggers a download of the file.
There are many shell extension types which can access to your files. Icon handler can read file to create icon, Info tip handler can read file to create text hint, Data object handler can read file to create clipboard data and so on.
Questions from developer with the same problem: first and second. Solution was to create namespace shell extension. NSE can control all access to your files.
I have a type of data file associated with my program. I can run my program by clicking on a shortcut, or by double-clicking on the data file. Standard Windows stuff.
However, I need to be able to set the Starts In folder to a specific folder. Everything is fine when I use the shortcut (because that has a Starts In parameter), but when I double-click on a data file, the Starts In defaults to the local folder of the data file, which is not what I want.
To be more specific, I'm using a network dongle protection system (Safenet SHK) that requires an XML file to be in the Starts In folder before the protection shell allows my code to be run, so I can't just change the folder in my program, because it hasn't run yet.
What can I do?
You could create a launcher application. This application would do nothing but set the working directory and then start the real application and pass in the name of the file the user is trying to open. Your application shortcut can point to your main application, but the file associations you create would use the launcher.
I'm trying to do the following I'm not sure if it's possible using VB.NET.
I want to specify default saving point for all files type for example:
In my program you choose the path "C:\Users\Markus\Pictures" for pictures and everytime you download pictures files from website, or using skype or any other program when Save File Dialog opens up (external one not via my program or connected to vb.net just the windows default one) then it will show "C:\Users\Markus\Pictures" always for .jpg .gif type of files etc...
Thanks a lot.
This bits of codes should solve your problem
SaveFileDialog1.InitialDirectory = #"C:\Users\Markus\Pictures"
InitialDirectory property represents the directory to be displayed when the open file dialog appears first time.
SaveFileDialog1.Filter = "txt files (*.jpg)|*.jpg|All files (*.*)|*.*"
Filter property represents the filter on an open file dialog that is used to filter the type of files to be loaded during the browse option in an open file dialog.
refer to this link for more info
You can programmatically modify the paths of the Windows special directories (My Pictures, etc) in the registry key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders
However, your app will have to be granted permissions to do so (see RegistryPermission Class)
Of course, this will work for those file types that have entries in this registry key, and only if an external application uses this key
Problem: I have to support users who need to edit web pages. Some of these web pages exist only as textarea controls. Fortunately, there is a firefox plugin that allows the user to open the textarea in a default text editor. Unfortunately, this plugin requires you to point to the EXE file of the text editor you want to invoke.
This is a reasonable requirement, but ##$%^ Microsoft Expression Web is one of those applications whose shortcut .lnk file does not appear to point to a real EXE file. If there is an EXE file somewhere, it's hidden.
Question:
How can I locate the actual EXE file so people can configure Microsoft Expression web to be their editor of choice?
Update: I should have emphasized that I was looking for a way to automate this via script or batch file (hence the SO posting, in case anyone's "not-programming-related" spidey sense was tingling).
I found my executable in the following location:
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Expression\Web Designer\EXPRWD.EXE
I'm not sure if that gives you what you need, but you can always have your users (or programmatically) search for EXPRWD.EXE and go from there.