intercept xdg-open and forward it to the client

[Antoine Martin]

This could be enabled by default when we add at least a dialog showing that the file is ready to be opened (see #1375) since we don't want open-silently by default. (for security reasons)

• forwarding of files can re-use the "send-file" protocol: wiki/FileTransfers
• for urls we will need a new protocol message

Maybe each one could be enabled independently?

[Antoine Martin]

Basic support added in r17726.

xdg-open /some/file

Will end up sending the file to the client and ask it to open it. (which is not allowed by default)

[Antoine Martin]

forwarding of xdg-open for URLs

[Antoine Martin]

Done in:

• r17740: add prompt for accepting file-transfer/file-open (#1375)
• r17742: packaging of xdg-open override script
• r17743: support url-open with prompt
• r17744 + r17745: enable forward-xdg-open by default
• r17752: also redirect gnome-open and gvfs-open

Things that could be done to improve this:

• improve the popup dialog: #1375
• requires a unix-domain socket that does not require authentication, and we pass the socket path using an env var which is a bit iffy
• forward-xdg-open could support url, paths as options to only forward the type specified and let the other one through - meh

Notes:

• this only works from an environment we setup (we modify $PATH), so commands started with --start=xterm (or --start-child and friends), but not with DISPLAY=:N xterm
• some applications will bypass xdg-open, maybe we need to override xdg-mime for those? (PITA as this points to a desktop file..) - see ​Where does firefox get the “default” applications for opening files from? (esp comments: gnome-open, gvfs-open, gio open - some kind of sick joke?)
• more improvements recorded in ticket:1375#comment:7

---

How to test:

• start server with forward-xdg-open=no then xdg-open works normally (not overriden with our custom script)

From here on, with forward-xdg-open=yes (which is the default):

• in an xterm, run xdg-open https://xpra.org/, this should popup the dialog asking the client if it accepts to open this URL
• change the client's command line: set --open-url to no or yes, and check again
• for file-transfers, test with xdg-open /path/to/some/file.png, again, the dialog should come up
• and again, change --file-transfer to no or yes and check again (default value is ask)

@maxmylyn: just a FYI.

[J. Max Mena]

Noted and closing.

[Antoine Martin]

For the html5 client, see #1862.

[migration script]

this ticket has been moved to: ​https://github.com/Xpra-org/xpra/issues/1726