RE: Are we still supposed to register Creator code (bundle signature) for OS X app?
RE: Are we still supposed to register Creator code (bundle signature) for OS X app?
- Subject: RE: Are we still supposed to register Creator code (bundle signature) for OS X app?
- From: "M. Uli Kusterer" <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 6 Feb 2004 17:33:03 +0100
At 22:24 Uhr -0600 05.02.2004, Guy Umbright wrote:
Should an OS X app still register a Creator code?
If you are using a creator code, you should register it, yes.
I have an app that really has zero use for one.
Then don't enter a creator code on the properties pane. If you don't
enter one, you're not using it, and thus you don't need to register
it.
It open text files and saves
text files and I cannot imagine a case where you would want the app to be
the default for opening a type of file.
The creator code really doesn't have much to do with making it the
default these days. It simply indicates what application
(And how is the creator code well hidden? Its on the same property page
as the identifier?)
I was talking about Apple's creator and type code registry, which is
the place where you must register any creator codes that your app
owns.
Ah! Now I understand your question: I thought by "register" you
meant "register it with Apple via the type and creator code
registry". But you were referring to typing a creator code into the
"properties" pane of your application, right?
Well, there hasn't been official word from Apple on that. Well,
there has, but it was part of the infamous tech note 2034, which was
pulled a few days after its release. It's come up on the list a
couple times since then. If you search the archives of this list
you'll probably find one of the discussions. I'll try to summarize it
here quickly, but note that I'm in the pro-creator/file type camp,
which means I probably only remember what I want to:
1) Type and creator aren't strictly needed on MacOS X anymore. The OS
now uses the bundle identifier to tell apart applications. However,
types and creators aren't ignored either.
2) However, the user can re-assign file --> application mappings on a
per-creator basis in the Finder ("Change all"). Which gives finer
granularity than if it's done solely per-extension (which is what
happens for files without a creator). Some users see that as an
advantage (I can make all text files created with Guy's app in
CodeWarrior, while text files downloaded from the net will open in
OpenOffice), others see it as a disadvantage (I have to "change all"
for each creator, and can't just override it for all ".txt" files).
Since people have fewer apps than files usually, I think the former
is more powerful, and the latter isn't that much of a hassle.
3) MacOS 9 applications don't cope too well with files that don't
have a type and creator. If it's likely that your users will use
Classic apps to work on the files your app generates, chances are
you'll want to help them by assigning a type and creator to your app,
and to the files it creates. I posted a small NSDocument subclass
(UKDocument) that takes care of this transparently. I can put it up
on my web site if there's interest.
4) If you have a utility, it's also pretty common practice to let the
user enter a creator that will be set for the files (for text files
the type would just be "TEXT"), so they can pick an app to open it in.
Hope this info helped you a bit.
--
Cheers,
M. Uli Kusterer
------------------------------------------------------------
"The Witnesses of TeachText are everywhere..."
http://www.zathras.de
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