newby query - file types

Q & A for the old 2X Explorer file manager. For other topics, please use the corresponding forum.

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woodgnome
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Post by woodgnome »

is it possible to rejig file type associations in 2xExplorer? the facility for doing this in windoze explorer is pretty clunky and inflexible, imo.

btw, congrats on a v. quick, slick and comprehensible piece of s/w. only wish i'd picked up on it sooner.
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nikos
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Post by nikos »

no

you need to go the system way -- use Start | Folder options if you can't stand the regular explorer sight :). Another option would be to use the registry directly to edit the relevant key e.g. <b>HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\txtfile\shell\open</b>, but I'd only recommend that to people with <i>substantial</i> familiarity with regedit and the way shell stores info in the registry.
woodgnome
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Post by woodgnome »

your replies are as fast as your software! ;-)

re. the registry solution - i'd prefer something a bit more object oriented, being a bit of a butter fingers!

is there any prospect of this facility being introduced at some point? then i never need stray anywhere else again!
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nikos
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Post by nikos »

well, i don't think that you can do any better than the present standard association procedure (what would i>you</i> want to see instead? -- i can't see much room for improvement)

the only think i could add in the future is a menu item calling the standard association dialog directly within 2x, so as to spare you the plight of opening the crappo explorer :)
woodgnome
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Post by woodgnome »

well, that would be something! :-)

as for improvements: how about being able to order the list of file types by their associations, rather than just alphabetically, which is all windoze will currently allow.

i have a lot of software on my machine and being able to group file types with a common association (plus their identical icons), would make it a snip to locate what a piece of software is dealing with! that would be a definite boon, imo!

(if this seems like complete cobblers though, then it probably is!)
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nikos
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Post by nikos »

typical for windows, isn't it?
They make a good job, then they leave a couple of small details out (like the sort by extension you mention) which make the whole "product" unusable in the long term, since it ends up hurting your tits ;)

it wouldn't be easy for me to repair this glitch --- i'd have to write the thing from scratch. However, you can get help from the registry in cases when you can't figure out the windoze file type name that corresponds to an extension you are after.

Let's work with an example. To find out the name of files with ".txt" extension you open regedit and try to locate .txt immediately under the key HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT. Check out it's <b>Default</b> value in the right pane, which in this case is "txtfile". Then you look this up under the same key --- it's going to be further down; to quickly jump onto it press a few of its starting characters 't' , 'x' etc. Now the default value of <i>that</i> key is the file type name that would appear in the Folder Options dialog | File Types tab.

So next time you have trouble locating a document type you'll know how to go about finding it!

(i figure that you may know all these things already but this newsgroup is for the benefit of all readers!)
woodgnome
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Post by woodgnome »

sorry for the delay in replying - thought i'd ticked the email notification box.

thanx for the reg tip - not exactly intuitive but better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick from bill gates!

and thank you for volunteering to rewrite the whole code from scratch - all to satisfy one pernickety user of your otherwise faultless software (as my mum used to say "flattery might get you somewhere!").

btw, i find these things hurt my brain before they start bothering my tits but, hey, that's me! ;-)

another query: my 2XExplorer opens up in a non maximised state. is this alterable, so that it always boots up full screen size?
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Sal
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Post by Sal »

another query: my 2XExplorer opens up in a non maximised state. is this alterable, so that it always boots up full screen size?
The answer to that question in here. :)
http://forum.zabkat.com/topic.cgi?forum=15&topic=8
woodgnome
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Post by woodgnome »

most excellent.

cheers! :-)
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