mime-type icons, a proposal

[Waldo Bastian]

On Monday 04 October 2004 08:22, Alexander Larsson wrote:
> > > No, the inheritance specifies "is also". The mimetype itself specifies
> > > actual physical compatibility. Files of type "text/plain" have certain
> > > characteristics ("application/x-gzip" would make a better example since
> > > it would actually imply a certain well-defined file-format) So when
> > > "application/python-src" inherits from "text/plain", we say it "is
> > > also" of type text/plain: it has also all the charactestics typical for
> > > the "text/plain" format (If it had inherited from "application/x-gzip"
> > > it would mean that files of the "application/python-src" type had the
> > > gzip file format by definition)
> > >
> > > The "wordprocessor document" type means "document generated with a
> > > wordprocessor", this doesn't translate to a particular on-disk file
> > > format (which is why the file type determination function will never
> > > return it as type) but the inheritance relationship is the same, if
> > > another MIME-type inherits it it means that having a file of this other
> > > MIME-type also implies that the file has all the characteristics of
> > > "wordprocessor document".
> >
> > I still don't like adding nonstandard MIME types that are not even
> > "real" mime types to the database just because this allows us to use an
> > implementation detail to allow search-by-category. I mean, the same
> > results could be gotten from defining a key "is-of-category" in the mime
> > database, and filling it in like you would fill out the inheritance with
> > fake mimetypes. The UI for using this would be exactly the same as the
> > one that used fake mimetypes. (I.e. It'd contain a dropdown list of
> > known document types to look for.)
> >
> > It also avoids some multiple inheritance.
>
> Also, it means that if you want to use the category to pick the fallback
> icon that is easily determinated, which it isn't if you use the normal
> inheritance for this. If your document type inherits from both gzip and
> "spreadsheet", how do you know which one to use for icon?

That would need to be solved then indeed.

Cheers,
Waldo
-- 
bastian at kde.org  |  Wanted: Talented KDE developer  |  bastian at suse.com
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