How to use the xdg-mime command

Question

Can someone provide example on how to use (with GNOME Ubuntu) the XDG-MIME command? I'm struggling to get anything working even with the docs.

For example if I want to register the extension .mfe with an application called MyApp what would the steps be? This is my attempt so far, I would appreciate any pointers on getting this right...

This is my xml (MyApp-MyFileType.xml) How is the file name relavent?

<?xml version="1.0"?> <mime-info xmlns='http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info'>   <mime-type type="text/mfe">     <comment>File for MyApp</comment>     <glob pattern="*.mfe"/>   </mime-type> </mime-info> 

Then is run this command?

xdg-mime install MyApp-MyFileType.xml 

And then I run this? What does the xxx relate to?, I understand it to be an identifier to my application but how do I define it?

xdg-mime default xxx.desktop text/mfe 

Answer 1

All the needed information is in man xdg-mime.

1. Check the actual mime-type with xdg-mime query filetype filename.ext (the response could be e.g. application/octet-stream)

2. If you decide to create your own mime-type you should edit an XML file like the example you gave. You should check if the mime-type name you want to create exists to not override it. You can see the registered mime-types in /usr/share/applications/defaults.list.

3. Then, as you pointed out, it's time to register the new mime-type with sudo xdg-mime install --mode system MyApp-MyFileType.xml to install for all users on the system.

4. At this point, if you check again the mime-type (like in step 1.) you should have the desired response (your new mime-type).

5. Now it's time to register the new mime-type with the desired application. The association is done with sudo xdg-mime default MyApp.desktop text/mfe (in your example). To see the available .desktop files just do: ls /usr/share/applications | less (I think this is what you were looking for).

6. The last step is registering the icon with xdg-icon-resource but that's another topic.

Hope this helps!

Answer 2

To be able to xdg-open afile.myapp:

1. make a description xml for the file type, like you did.
2. run xdg-mime install vendor-filetype.xml
3. make a myapp.desktop file for your application, like this: .desktop example
4. run xdg-mime default myapp.desktop filetype