MIMEset
version 0.9 beta

Copyright ©1998 David Mitchell

About MIMEset

MIMEset is a freeware utility to help you set the MIME types of files that either have no type, or the wrong type.  This happens most often when downloading files from other operating systems.  While the BeOS does a pretty good job of identifying these files, it isn't perfect.  Some types of files it doesn't know about at all.  Occasionally it will get the type wrong.  MIMEset is designed to help you handle these situations.

The BeOS does include the FileType application/add-on that offers some help.  However, it's kind of slow to use if you have a lot of files that need to be changed.  MIMEset can often help, but it is not a replacement for FileType.

Warning!

MIMEset is designed to be easy to use safely.  However, the MIME types of files are an important part of the BeOS.  Setting the type of a file incorrectly may make it impossible to open that file.  In the case of system files, incorrect types may actually make your system ususable.  In order to make MIMEset safer to use, it takes the following steps:

1: You are not allowed to drop a directory onto it in order to change the types of the files in that directory.  Careless use of this feature could easily result in lots of unintended files being affected.  Imagine dropping the "Disks" icon onto MIMEset for a worst-case scenario!

2: You are not allowed to specify a file type directly.  You must already have at least one file with the MIME type you want in order to use MIMEset.  This will prevent you from polluting your file type database with incorrect MIME types due to typos and such.

Unless you are sure that you know what you are doing, I would not recommend changing the type of any files contained inside of:

/boot/beos
or
/boot/home/config

Simple Directions

MIMEset is a drag-n-drop only application that is designed to be easy to use.  The main window contains two boxes, labeled "Sample File" and "Target Files".  Setting the type of a file takes two steps.  First, find a file that already has the type you want and drop it onto the "Sample File" box.  You should see a green circle as you drag the file.  After you drop the file, you will see the string "Uninitialized" at the top of the window change to the type of the file you dropped ("text/html" for example).  Now, any files you drop onto the "Target Files" box will have their type changed to "text/html" (or whatever other type you chose.  You can drop multiple files at once onto the Target box if you want.  Directories, however, are not allowed.

As you drag over a box, you will see that it either draws a green circle or a red X.  Dropping something onto the green circle will cause the program to take some action.  Dropping onto a red X will have no effect.  The "Sample File" box only allows you to drop a single file at a time.  If you were to drop any more files, they might have multiple MIME types, and MIMEset wouldn't know which one to use.  The "Target Files" box only allows drops after the program has been initialized by dropping something onto the "Sample File" box.  In addition, the "Target Files" box will not allow you to drop directories onto it.

Bugs

There are no known bugs in MIMEset.  However, it is missing a few features.

1: It should be a replicant.

2: It is not resizable nor font sensitive.  So, changing your system fonts to something large may have negative effects on it's appearance.  It should continue to work however.

3: The window always appears at the same location.

Contacting the Author

Just drop me an email at: mitchell@141.com

Disclaimer

This program is provided with no warranty express or implied.  It may or may not work as claimed.  The author is not responsible in any way for any damage you may do to your system with this program.  The author is especially not responsible for damage done with versions that have been modified to recursively target directories.

License

This program is freeware.  Feel free to use it for whatever you want, as long as you don't sell it.   If you make any improvements to the source code, please send them to me.  Please do not distribute binaries with the directory features re-enabled.  Also, please let me know if you find any bugs, or would like to see any improvements.