Posted: Tue Jun 15, 2004 12:46 am Post subject: Support for Mac aliases (as opposed to symlinks)?
I just re-happened upon this issue (from way before I knew about trinity, etc., and my "solution" then was to alter my file arrangement), but I started a new project and found it again. Not sure if ths is the right forum for it, either, but...
OOo 1.0.3GM (and thus NeoJ) and 1.1.x RC/TP don't seem to be able to handle/follow traditional Mac file or folder aliases (instead, they attempt to open the alias file itself) in open/save boxes, etc. Symlinks are fine (as one would expect), but the Finder, and I imagine most users, create the traditional variety.
Is there any chance of support for this making it into the X11 builds or is this a feature that needs to wait for 2.0/Aqua/Neo? (Or is it already there and just not working for me? )
Joined: May 25, 2003 Posts: 4752 Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posted: Wed Jun 16, 2004 10:52 pm Post subject:
No, you are correct...right now the X11 versions probably don't resolve aliases correctly as they're using the regular POSIX file system calls and not the magic HFS calls that resolve them automatically. I actually hadn't noticed this myself, but I guess this is primarily through habit since I ususally make symlinks these days.
I'd probably go ahead and file something in IZ about this. I'm not sure if it's easy to solve, though. A quick test in Terminal showed that I can't use "cd" to cd to a directory that's an alias. This may be something very fundamental to OS X apps that don't use Carbon or Cocoa file APIs, however.
I'll add this limitation to the readme. It's similar to how OOo can't open locked files either
Being an ordinary OOo/NeoJ Mac "end" user with no real Unix experience: can you direct me to the magic to make "symlinks"? Since OOo is the office suite I use to manage my business, and using aliases has been a habit of mine, I would like to overcome the current limitation of OOo/NeoJ. If this is not a subject for elaboration here, can you please direct me to where I could find such instructions.
Joined: May 25, 2003 Posts: 4752 Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posted: Thu Jun 17, 2004 12:09 am Post subject:
I'm not sure if there's a way to make symlinks from the Finder, I use the Terminal (/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app).
The command to make a symlink is "ln -s". The syntax is "ln -s fromto".
Say, for example, you wanted to make an alias to your OS 9 Documents folder (directly on the startup disk) within your home directory Documents folder. You would open up a Terminal and do the following:
Code:
cd ~
cd Documents
ln -s /Documents "Documents (Mac OS 9)"
The first "cd ~" moves you to your home directory. The "cd Documents" moves you into your Documents folder. Then the final "ln" makes a link named "Documents (Mac OS 9)" that points to the old-style "Documents" folder that lives on your startup disk.
Joined: May 25, 2003 Posts: 4752 Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posted: Thu Jun 17, 2004 12:11 am Post subject:
A quick Googling also revealed the following tutorial which may be a better explanation for traditional Mac users about the differences between aliases and symbolic links:
Posted: Thu Jun 17, 2004 1:14 am Post subject: Re: Aliases and symlinks
OPENSTEP wrote:
No, you are correct...right now the X11 versions probably don't resolve aliases correctly as they're using the regular POSIX file system calls and not the magic HFS calls that resolve them automatically. I actually hadn't noticed this myself, but I guess this is primarily through habit since I ususally make symlinks these days.
I'd probably go ahead and file something in IZ about this. I'm not sure if it's easy to solve, though. A quick test in Terminal showed that I can't use "cd" to cd to a directory that's an alias. This may be something very fundamental to OS X apps that don't use Carbon or Cocoa file APIs, however.
I'll add this limitation to the readme. It's similar to how OOo can't open locked files either
ed
FYI. Although I have done limited testing, "Start OpenOffice.org" v1.0b9 seems to handle both aliases and symlinks to documents quite happily and correctly (both dragged to the "Start OpenOffice.org" application icon, and OOo document alias/symlink documents that are double-clicked).
Note: if you move/rename the original document, aliases to the document will continue to work; but symlinks to the document won't work (as explained elsewhere in this forum).
Of course, it doesn't open up a nice, pretty, formatted page like HMUG (now that's a trick!), nor does it seem to work in these fora but it does give you the manpage for the version of the OS/command you have on your Mac
Joined: Sep 08, 2003 Posts: 63 Location: Teesside, UK
Posted: Thu Jun 17, 2004 3:35 pm Post subject:
If you want to use symbolic links instead of aliases, without going to the Terminal all the time, try the free SymbolicLinker contextual menu plugin by Nick Zitsmann, available here . Just select the file(s) you want to link to and (Ctrl/Right)-click
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