RE: links

[Paul Hepworth <phepworth s-vision com>]

These are not just symlinks.  Rather, they contain extended information
such as icon, parameters, etc.  (BTW, these came from OS/2 before
windows or KDE; they are called Program Objects.)
If only we could count on our filesystems to support extended attributes
(like OS/2 and VMS, something like Mac), we could attach extended
attributes to symlinks.  Might be worth making an EA engine to run on
top of the filesystem.  DFM (a cool OS/2-like desktop manager) allows
you to attach EA-like attributes to symlinks, folders, and other files;
it stores them all in a .dfminfo file.  Works like a charm!  DFM also
comes with a tiny program that can launch programs from any file based
on its file type or extension;  this could be incorporated into gnome.
Corbafied or guilified, this little launcher could be used in a gnome
desktop, file manager, file dialogs, etc.


Paul