On Monday 22 February 2016 18:10:16 Giles Atkinson wrote:
> Genghis,
> 
> I have been thinking about this some more, and I think the extension of 
> Type=Link is
> probably not needed.  I can not see how it can do anything that can not be 
> done
> with Type=Exec and a small shell script.   That will also be more portable, 
> as the
> behaviour of destkop files varies among desktop environments.
> 
> As far as I can tell, Type=Link is itself redundant.  I can see no difference 
> in behaviour
> between these two desktop files:
> 
> [Desktop Entry]
> Version=1.0
> Type=Link
> Name=Link to BBC
> URL=http://www.bbc.co.uk
> Icon=BBC
> 
> [Desktop Entry]
> Version=1.0
> Type=Exec
> Name=Link to BBC
> Exec=xdg-open http://www.bbc.co.uk
> Icon=BBC

There are a few differences, depending on context. E.g. in konqueror clicking 
on the Type=Link
desktop file will open that URL in that same window, rather than launching a 
separate executable.

Similarly, Type=Link with URL=file:///tmp will allow a file manager to just 
navigate to that directory
rather than launching something else -- therefore it's a way to have symlinks 
that support translations.

> My guess is that Type=Link was defined before the xdg-utils programs.

That is correct, but not a sufficient argument for obsolescence.

-- 
David Faure, [email protected], http://www.davidfaure.fr
Working on KDE Frameworks 5

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