492276 - Opening (file) dialog should offer a "default desktop application" checkbutton

Status: UNCONFIRMED

(Firefox :: File Handling, enhancement)

Description

[Sylvain Paré]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.9.0.10) Gecko/2009042523 Ubuntu/9.04 (jaunty) Firefox/3.0.10
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.9.0.10) Gecko/2009042523 Ubuntu/9.04 (jaunty) Firefox/3.0.10

To win in ergonomics Firefox Opening dialog should offer to the user the possibility to call automatically to good application for him i.e his preferred application for a type of file according to his desktop preferences.
Here is a mokup http://pare.sylvain.neuf.fr/Fxmokup.png
The idea is to display dinamicaly the name of the application that Fx will call.
Like this the user do not even have to chose something. But if he wants, he can! :)
And this could be the default choice 
This feature can be perform under linux by using xdg-open 
http://portland.freedesktop.org/xdg-utils-1.0/xdg-open.html

Reproducible: Always

Comment 1

[Michel Loiseleur]

Attachment: An other mokup : no selector at all

I have a simpler mokup to submit : it's hiding the selector and should reappear with an option of about:config. 
One does not have to choose application when clicking on a file from an explorer like nautilus, dolphin or even the win32 shell. Having a separate files associations list in gecko complicates a lot of things : When one chooses to change a favorite application, he has to do it in its desktop environment, in its Firefox and in its Thunderbird. From an end user point of view, it's quite disturbing : user is asked to do the job of an integrator.

Comment 2

[Sylvain Paré]

yep I really agree with you about several chooser. But I thinks it is also ergonomic to don't put the choice too far, in the about:config for example.

Comment 3

[Skippy le Grand Gourou]

I definitely agree this would be a very useful feature. Actually, this should be automatic.

Indeed, I don't see why someone would generally want Firefox to open files with some app when he wants his desktop file manager to open them with another app, it doesn't make sense.  However, I can see why someone would want to *occasionnaly* open a file with another app.

In an explorer like nautilus, you always have the right-click then Open With option.  So I would not vote for Michel's proposal, nor would I add a specific field : I would just make Firefox defaults apps the same as they are already defined in the desktop environment.