How to configure org-mode to respect system-specific default applications for external links?

Question

In org-mode I can define external links for example as

[[file+sys:path/to/document.pdf]]

The file document.pdf is then opened with an external pdf viewer. The org-mode documentation claims that this command "open[s] via OS, like double-click".

There is, however, a difference to "double-click", as I find that the system-specific default applications (for documents, websites, videos, etc.) are not respected in my setup; On Ubuntu 12.04 the default application for webpages was set to Firefox and only through org-mode local .html files are still openend with Chromium.

How do I configure org-mode to respect my default application settings?

Answer 1

Here are my settings:

(setq org-file-apps
      '((auto-mode . emacs)
        ("\\.x?html?\\'" . "firefox %s")
        ("\\.pdf\\'" . "evince \"%s\"")
        ("\\.pdf::\\([0-9]+\\)\\'" . "evince \"%s\" -p %1")
        ("\\.pdf.xoj" . "xournal %s")))

Answer 2

If you are using a Linux desktop environment, chances are that it is using xdg-utils. See this blog post.

Therefore, you may do this:

(setq org-file-apps
      '((auto-mode . emacs)
        ("\\.x?html?\\'" . "xdg-open %s")
        ("\\.pdf\\'" . "xdg-ope, \"%s\"")
        ("\\.pdf::\\([0-9]+\\)\\'" . "xdg-open \"%s\" -p %1")
        ("\\.pdf.xoj" . "xournal %s")))

Answer 3

There's a couple of utility vars defined in later versions of org-mode:

org-file-apps-defaults-gnu
org-file-apps-default-macosx
org-file-apps-default-windowsnt

that should set up reasonable defaults for those environments.

Use them like this:

(setq org-file-apps org-file-apps-defaults-macosx)

Answer 4

C-h describe-variable org-file-apps-macos

Copy default application settings, then add your own.

My Own config is (".png" . "open %s")

(setq org-file-apps-macos '((remote . emacs)
                            (system . "open %s")
                            ("ps.gz" . "gv %s")
                            ("eps.gz" . "gv %s")
                            ("dvi" . "xdvi %s")
                            ("fig" . "xfig %s")
                            (t . "open %s")
                            (".png" . "open %s")))