[Doc-SIG] Re: DPS file extensions

[Tony J Ibbs (Tibs)]

David Goodger wrote:
> There actually is a mechanism on MacOS for cross-platform
> compatibility. You associate a filename extension with an existing
> application & filetype. It's similar to what you do on Windows.

Well, on Windows its much more optional, since there *are* file types,
and they do still matter (since that's what the registration, if any,
keys off).

> The point is, though, that dealing with this automatically is a royal
> pain, and asking people to do it manually won't fly (*I* wouldn't do
> it if asked!). So I'd rather not. Maybe later, but not now.

Sounds like it should indeed be a definite "leave until later".

> If somebody were to cook up bulletproof multi-platform (means
> Win/Mac/*n*x, not just Win/*n*x) code for this, I would be happy to
> add it to the project(s). Maybe there's already support for it in
> distutils? But the code would have to be *really* bulletproof.

[and that will mean Mac "classic" OS and the new Mac OS as well - I bet
they'll do things differently - and I'd want to hold some support out to
Linux window managers as well - so it *is* a biggish task.]

I half-watch the distutils list, and I don't remember anything there
about registering file types at all. However, it *does* sound like the
sort of thing that distutils *should* be able to do (at least to me). Of
course, in the classic way, volunteers need to be around to do it, and
this actually sounds like it may be something to address after docutils
is finished (!) if noone else has done it. I agree it is *not* urgent!

[in fact, so not urgent that I haven't even bothered to mention it on
the distutils SIG, mainly since we're not volunteering said effort...]

Interestingly, today's message on the distutils SIG is about compiling
on Macs...

Tibs

--
Tony J Ibbs (Tibs)      http://www.tibsnjoan.co.uk/
Give a pedant an inch and they'll take 25.4mm
(once they've established you're talking a post-1959 inch, of course)
My views! Mine! Mine! (Unless Laser-Scan ask nicely to borrow them.)