Chapter 4 MIME Types

This chapter describes how applications detect MIME types, how to register MIME types, and how to add applications to the GNOME Desktop.

• Introduction to MIME Types

• Detecting the MIME Type for a File

• Registering Applications for MIME Types

• Adding an Application to the GNOME Desktop

Introduction to MIME Types

A Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension (MIME) type identifies the format of a file. The MIME type enables applications to read the file. Applications such as Internet browsers and email applications use the MIME type to handle files of different types. For example, an email application can use the MIME type to detect what type of file is in a file attached to an email.

The Nautilus file manager uses MIME types to identify the type of a file. The file manager needs to know the MIME type of a file to perform the following tasks:

• Open the file in an appropriate application.

• Display a string that describes the type of file.

• Display an appropriate icon to represent the file.

• Display a list of other applications that can open the file.

If you add a new application, you must ensure that other applications can recognize the files associated with the application. You must perform several tasks to enable other applications to detect the MIME type of the application files.

This section describes how applications detect the MIME types of files, and how applications are associated with MIME types. This chapter also describes the procedure that you must follow to add a new application.

Detecting the MIME Type for a File

Applications can detect the MIME type of a file as follows:

1. The application uses file content sniffers to search for a particular pattern in the file. A file content sniffer associates a specific pattern in a file with a MIME type. If the application finds a match for the pattern, the MIME type associated with the pattern is the MIME type of the file.

2. If file content sniffers do not identify the MIME type, then the application can check the filename. The application checks the filename against the MIME type registry. The MIME type registry associates particular file extensions and filename patterns, with particular MIME types. If a match for the filename is found, the MIME type associated with the extension or pattern is the MIME type of the file.

The following sections provide further information on file content sniffers and the MIME type registry.

File Content Sniffers

File content sniffers are specified in the file /etc/gnome-vfs-mime-magic. The following is an example of a file content sniffer:

0	string		\x89PNG					image/png

The syntax for file content sniffers is as follows:

offset_start[:offset_end] pattern_type pattern [&pattern_mask] type

Table 4–1 describes the fields in a file content sniffer.

Pattern Masks

A pattern mask identifies bits in the pattern to ignore when searching for a pattern in a file. The following is an example of a file content sniffer with a pattern mask:

0     string          BMxxxx\000\000 &0xffff00000000ffff      image/bmp

The pattern and mask in the example are as follows:

The pattern and mask specify a file with the following characteristics:

1. The file begins with BM.

2. BM is followed by four bytes with any values.

3. The four bytes are followed by \000\000.

The file content sniffer specifies that the MIME type of files that match the pattern and mask is image/bmp.

MIME Type Registry

The MIME type registry is located in /usr/share/mime-info. The MIME type registry contains the following files:

The following sections describe MIME information files and MIME keys files.

MIME Information Files

MIME information files associate MIME types with one or both of the following:

• File extensions

• Filename patterns

When an application searches for the MIME type of a file, the application checks the filename against the MIME information files. If a match for the filename is found, the MIME type associated with the extension or pattern is the MIME type of the file.

In MIME information files, the filename pattern to search for is written as a regular expression.

The format of MIME type entries in MIME information files is as follows:

MIME-type
		ext[,priority]: list-of-extensions
		regex[,priority]: list-of-regular-expressions

You can specify a priority value for the file extension and the regular expression. You can use the priority value to differentiate composite filenames. For example, you can assign a priority of 1 to the .gz extension, and assign a higher priority of 2 to the .tar.gz extension. In this case, the file abc.tar.gz takes the MIME type for .tar.gz.

You must indent the ext field and the regex field with a tab character (\t).

The following MIME type entries are samples from the gnome-vfs.mime MIME information file:

application/x-compressed-tar
		regex,2: tar\.gz$
		ext: tgz
audio/x-real-audio
		ext: rm ra ram
image/jpeg
		ext: jpe jpeg jpg
image/png
		ext: png
text/html
		ext: html htm HTML
text/plain
		ext: asc txt TXT
text/x-readme
		regex: README.*

The file manager reads the MIME information files alphabetically. The alphabetical order determines the order in which MIME types are assigned to file extensions or regular expressions. For example, if the same file extension is assigned to different MIME types in the files abc.mime and def.mime, the MIME type in abc.mime is used.

MIME Keys Files

MIME keys file provide information about a MIME type that is used in the user interface. For example, the MIME keys file provides a description of a MIME type, and specifies an icon to represent files of that MIME type.

The following is a sample from a MIME keys file:

text/html
		description=HTML page
		icon_filename=gnome-text-html
		default_action_type=application
		short_list_application_ids_for_novice_user_level=mozilla,netscape,galeon
		category=Documents/World Wide Web

You must indent the keys in a MIME keys file with a tab character (\t).

Table 4–2 describes the most important keys in MIME keys files. Typically, the description key and the category key are localized.

short_list_application_ids
_for_novice_user_level

Registering Applications for MIME Types

The application registry contains text files that register applications. The application registration files contain a series of key-value pairs that specify details for applications. For example, the application registration files contain the following information:

• The command to use to start the application.

• MIME types to associate with the application.

An application registration file can contain one or more application registrations. Application registration files have a .applications extension.

The location of the application registry is /usr/share/application-registry. This directory contains a default application registration file that is called gnome-vfs.applications.

To register an application, add a registration file for the application to the application registry.

The following is an example of an application registration:

eog
		command=eog
		name=Eye of Gnome
		can_open_multiple_files=true
		expects_uris=false
		requires_terminal=false
		mime_types=image/bmp,image/gif,image/jpeg,image/png,image/tiff,
image/x-xpixmap,image/x-bmp,image/x-png,image/x-portable-anymap,
image/x-portable-bitmap,image/x-portable-graymap,
image/x-portable-pixmap

Table 4–3 describes the keys in application registration files.

Adding an Application to the GNOME Desktop

To add an application to the GNOME Desktop, perform the following steps:

1. Add a menu item for the application. For more information on how to add an item to a menu, see Chapter 2, Customizing Menus.

2. Add an icon for the application to /usr/share/icons/theme-name/icon-size/apps. For more information on icons and themes, see Chapter 3, Installing Themes.

3. If the application uses a new MIME type, add a file content sniffer for the new MIME type. For more information on file content sniffers, see File Content Sniffers.

4. If the application uses a new MIME type, add a MIME information file for the application to the MIME type registry. For more information on MIME information files, see MIME Information Files.

5. Add a MIME keys file for the application to the MIME type registry. For more information on MIME keys files, see MIME Keys Files.

6. If the application uses a new MIME type, add an icon for the MIME type to /usr/share/icons/theme-name/icon-size/mimetypes. For more information on icons and themes, see Chapter 3, Installing Themes.

7. To associate the application with a MIME type, add an application registration file to the application registry. For more information on the application registry, see Registering Applications for MIME Types.