[Portland] xdg_vfs_gnome command line client

[Jeremy White]

Whoa.

Wait, this all seems like a bad idea to me.

The concept of xdg-utils, in my mind at least, is that every function
it provides is an abstract desktop environment independent function.

The whole *point* of xdg-utils is that I don't want to know
the inner details of gnome vfs.

Now, if you extend the implementation of the existing higher
level scripts, or create new scripts to provide neat features,
that would be great.

Forgive me if I've misunderstood, but I think it's really important
for xdg-utils to stay simple and at least conceptually independent
of the underlying desktop environment.

Cheers,

Jeremy

nf2 wrote:
> I have just put together a KIO counterpart (xdg_vfs_kde). Please try!
> 
> One problem i had with KIO is mimetype detection (the -m switch). It's
> not as easy as in Gnome-VFS, where
> gnome_vfs_get_file_info() and gnome_vfs_directory_open() automatically
> return mimetypes for listed files.
> Is there a way to tell KIO::ListJob and KIO::StatJob to return
> UDS_MIME_TYPE or at least UDS_GUESSED_MIME_TYPE?
> Or should i call KMimeType::findByURL() for every file?
> 
> Norbert
> 
> 
> nf2 wrote:
> 
>> Hi,
>>
>> A little contribution to the Portland Project:
>>
>> http://www.scheinwelt.at/~norbertf/dadapt/files/xdg_utils/
>>
>> Perhaps an easy way to provide VFS access to 3rd party apps,
>> at least for the beginning...
>>
>> regards,
>> Norbert
>>
>>
>> XDG_VFS_GNOME
>> =============
>>
>> xdg_vfs_gnome is a command line client for gnome-vfs. It can read and
>> write
>> files, list directories, open file-dialogs,... File-data is not stored in
>> temporary files, but instead is pushed/pulled via stdin and stdout.
>>
>> xdg_vfs_gnome is linked to the gnomeui libraries and therefore will pop
>> up password dialogs etc. (which the gnome-vfs command line utilities
>> can't)
>>
>> The aim of 'xdg_vfs_gnome' is to give third party desktop applications
>> access
>> to Gnome-VFS without linking to the Gnome-libraries directly. It could
>> be hidden behind a generic 'xdg_vfs' script, which switches between KIO,
>> Gnome-VFS,... command line clients.
>>
>>
>> Samples:
>> ========
>>
>> -) reading a file
>>
>> $ xdg_vfs_gnome get file:///etc/lilo.conf
>>
>> $ xdg_vfs_gnome get http://www.freedesktop.org
>>
>> will stream a remote file to stdout which could be read into the hosts
>> applications memory via the C-function popen(..,'r');
>>
>> $ xdg_vfs_gnome openfiledlg --instant-get
>>
>> will open a file-dialog to browse to a remote or local file and instantly
>> stream the file-data of the selected file to stdout.
>>
>> $ xdg_vfs_gnome openfiledlg --instant-get --qry-fileinfo --slow-mime
>> --tagged
>>
>> By adding those switches xdg_vfs_gnome will also 'stat' the remote
>> file and
>> try to detect it's mime-type, size,...
>>
>> -) writing a file
>>
>> $ cat /etc/passwd | xdg_vfs_gnome put ftp://user@host/mydir/file.txt
>>
>> or use something like popen(..,'w') to stream file-data to create a
>> remote file.
>>
>> -) listing a directory
>>
>> $ xdg_vfs_gnome ls sftp://user@host/dir/
>>
>>
>> There are two operation modes:
>> ==============================
>>
>> *) single command
>>
>> *) shell mode (like the command-line ftp client). In shell mode the
>>   host application can talk to 'xdg_vfs_gnome' by connecting to the
>>   stdin and stdout pipes to execute a sequence of vfs commands.
>>   (for instance QProcess or functions like g_spawn_async_with_pipes()
>> allow
>>   connecting to stdin and stdout of a child process)
>>
>> The advantage of shell mode is that passwords are kept in memory
>> (the user doesn't have log in again and again) and avoiding startup-delay
>> when executing multiple commands (for instance if the client application
>> is a file-manager)
>>
>> Tagged-mode:
>> ============
>>
>> the -t, --tagged option tells xdg_gnome_vfs to add 'labels' when a
>> command
>> returns multiple 'parts'. For instance
>>
>>> xdg_vfs_gnome openfiledlg --instant-get --qry-fileinfo --tagged
>>
>>
>> will return an [OpenFileDlg], a [FileInfo] and a [Data] section.
>>
>> Escaping file data:
>> ===================
>>
>> When operating in shell- or tagged- mode you will need an escape
>> character
>> to signal the end of binary data. This is done via the -e and
>> --escape-data
>> switch. By default '~' is the escape character. '~~' has to be treated as
>> single '~' and '~\n' as EOF. The escape-character can be changed by
>> the -e35 or --escape-data=35 option. (when you want to use '#' ASCII 35
>> as escape
>> character)
>>
>> Usage screen:
>> =============
>>
>> Usage: xdg_vfs_gnome [command] [options] [filename]
>>
>>  Commands:
>>      get  [filename]            : remote file->stdout
>>      info [file or dir]         : stat a remote file->stdout
>>      put  [filename]            : stdin->create remote file
>>      ls   [dir]                 : list directory
>>      openfiledlg [dir]          : show open file dialog and return
>> selected file
>>      savefiledlg [dir] [fname]  : show save file dialog and return
>> selected file
>>      shell                      : interactive mode
>>
>>  Options:
>>      -t, --tagged               : tagged mode (file-data should be
>> escaped)
>>      -i, --qry-fileinfo         : qry file-info when retrieving a file
>>                                   requires tagged mode!
>>      -m, --slow-mime            : more accurate mime-type detection
>> (slow)
>>      -e, --escape-data          : escape file data (for end of data
>> detection)
>>      -eXXX, --escape-data=XXX   : set and use a user defined escape
>> character
>>                                   XXX = ascii code!
>>      --end-seperator=           : add a custom separator inbetween blocks
>>      --overwrite                : allow overwriting files (put)
>>      --instant-get              : openfiledilog instant get file->stdout
>>      --instant-put              : savefiledilog instant put file from
>> stdin
>>
>> Todo:
>> =====
>>
>> *) Implement more VFS-Commands (set file-info, mkdir/rmdir, copy,
>> move,...)
>>
>> *) Progress reporting via stdout
>>
>> *) multi file-open-dialog
>>
>> *) Improve exit codes
>>
>> *) Write xdg_vfs_kde
>>
>> *) -w switch. Is there a way to pass the window-id to Gnome for accurate
>> placement of dialogs?
>>
>> *) Write a sample client application (a simple file-manager for instance)
>>
>> ...
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Portland mailing list
>> Portland at lists.freedesktop.org
>> http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/portland
> 
> 
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