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orphius

Member

Registered: 2009-01-24

Posts: 9

[SOLVED] How to open default text editor from bash script?

as header states i would like my script to open the desktops default text editor. I use xfce.
I currently have it set to open medit, however i want to be able to use script on other desktops

Last edited by orphius (2013-07-12 07:24:34)

oliver

Member

Registered: 2007-12-12

Posts: 448

Re: [SOLVED] How to open default text editor from bash script?

export your EDITOR in .bashrc and then use $EDITOR in your scripts?

Trilby

Inspector Parrot

Registered: 2011-11-29

Posts: 30,332

Website

Re: [SOLVED] How to open default text editor from bash script?

EDITOR will often not be the default desktop environment editor - it is usually limited to being a systemwide (and usually console-ready) editor.

xdg-open, or a related tool, can give you the desktop's text editor.

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"UNIX is simple and coherent" - Dennis Ritchie; "GNU's Not Unix" - Richard Stallman

thiagowfx

Member

Registered: 2013-07-09

Posts: 586

Re: [SOLVED] How to open default text editor from bash script?

Yeah, I think that you should set up the correct MIME types and then open your text files with xdg-open. Try the 'xdg-mime default' command.

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User:Thiagowfx

jakobcreutzfeldt

Member

Registered: 2011-05-12

Posts: 1,041

Re: [SOLVED] How to open default text editor from bash script?

EDITOR will often not be the default desktop environment editor - it is usually limited to being a systemwide (and usually console-ready) editor.

xdg-open, or a related tool, can give you the desktop's text editor.

Truth. VISUAL is typically used for the graphical text editor.

So, to use VISUAL if it exists, but otherwise default to medit, do:

editor="${VISUAL:-medit}"
$editor foo.txt

Last edited by jakobcreutzfeldt (2013-07-11 07:09:02)

orphius

Member

Registered: 2009-01-24

Posts: 9

Re: [SOLVED] How to open default text editor from bash script?

thank you jakobcreutzfeldt
  that was just what i needed