Is it possible to start the spreadsheet portion of NeoOffice

DEinspanjer · Red Pill Joined: Jul 04, 2009 Posts: 9 Location: Salem, NH

Whenever I need to create a new spreadsheet, I will do the following as demonstrated in the linked screencast:
1. Use Spotlight to open NeoOffice
2. Click the NeoOffice menu item
3. Change to Spreadsheet
4. Close the Text Document editor
http://screencast.com/t/8mMBZNek4

I'm wondering if there might be a way to create new spotlight entries like "NeoOffice - Spreadsheet" or change some preference such that it starts up by default because I use the spreadsheet much more than the text document editor.

Thanks for any ideas you might have.

-Daniel

yoxi · Posted: Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:55 pm Post subject:

Hi Daniel -

This page in the NeoWiki:

http://neowiki.neooffice.org/index.php/NeoOffice_Launch_Shortcuts

explains the several options for starting NeoOffice in the module of your choice.

- padmavyuha

DEinspanjer · Red Pill Joined: Jul 04, 2009 Posts: 9 Location: Salem, NH

Thank you yoxi for pointing me at the docs. I spent a little time familarizing myself with the system and came up with the following alternative that I wanted to share with everyone.

Attached is a script similar to the ones currently found in the MacOS folder within the NeoOffice bundle. The difference with this script is that it can pick up the arguments to pass to NeoOffice from the application preferences through the use of the "defaults" Mac OS X utility.

I made a screencast to show it's installation, configuration, and use. Hope it helps someone:
http://www.screencast.com/t/tJf9lxerqH

yoxi · Posted: Sat Jul 04, 2009 11:51 pm Post subject:

Thanks, that's another neat little solution for the tech-savvy - the only disadvantage I can see being (as with the other shell script options) that the user will have to reapply the solution after each main NeoOffice update (and quite likely after some patch updates, if they update the Info.plist file).

- padmavyuha

DEinspanjer · Red Pill Joined: Jul 04, 2009 Posts: 9 Location: Salem, NH

yoxi · Posted: Sun Jul 05, 2009 12:31 am Post subject:

I was wondering about a PrefPane myself after looking at your script - that's a good plan, let's see what they say... do you know whether the script behaves the same way in all the OSX versions NeoOffice supports? (10.4/10.5/10.6)

DEinspanjer · Red Pill Joined: Jul 04, 2009 Posts: 9 Location: Salem, NH

I can't say with certainty since I don't have a 10.4 or 10.6 box available to test, but I would definately expect it to. The defaults program has been around since 2003, and the bash syntax used is bash 3 compatible. I suppose with a little work, it could be rewritten as an sh script, but I figured since bash is the default interpreter on OS X it was the right target.

sardisson · Town Crier Joined: Feb 01, 2004 Posts: 4588

Speaking only for myself, this sounds like a really good solution, and the first one, I think, that has kept in mind the current behavior and the need to preserve that if it were to become the default launch script.

Other things I like:

* It doesn't modify any OOo files, only Neo's Info.plist (one less patch to track)
* User defaults (which we already use other places, e.g. disabling gestures or the remote control) allow you to easily set an all-the-time default for yourself, without touching the binary at all (survives across patch updates)
* Supports command-line arguments for one-time use--which also allows others to write additional script-apps to stand in for separate component applications, which many users also want.

Unfortunately, we can't really add any items to NeoOffice's preferences (hacking the OOo prefs system is a nightmare, I understand, even before you have to worry about the 70-some locales), but "defaults write" is simple enough, and it's almost as simple to write an AppleScript "chooser" for people who'd want to change the component but are deathly afraid of the Terminal.

I don't know enough about how the launch sequence works to know if there are any gotchas we're not considering, though (opening files on the command line or via 'open'?), and, sadly, I don't know if Patrick's schedule will allow him to investigate. Sad

Thanks for putting this together, Daniel!

Smokey

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

DEinspanjer · Red Pill Joined: Jul 04, 2009 Posts: 9 Location: Salem, NH

Since there was interest, I did a bit more digging around on what exactly the psn argument is, and it turns out it might be important depending on how NeoOffice is written. It is the "process serial number", described here: http://forums.macrumors.com/archive/index.php/t-69397/t-207344.html

So I modified the shell script to properly pass it along. Revised file is attached.

DEinspanjer · Red Pill Joined: Jul 04, 2009 Posts: 9 Location: Salem, NH

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

DEinspanjer · Red Pill Joined: Jul 04, 2009 Posts: 9 Location: Salem, NH

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

I think that I have implemented this new feature. Can you install the following test patch and tell us if it works for you?

With the following test patch, you can set a single default launch option using the following Terminal command. For example, to start in Calc by default, use the following command: