The VideoLAN Forums

I love VLC Media Player, so I have now ditched Quicktime and Windows Media Player.

It would be nice if VLC would come with an option to assign file types to it.

I had to do this manually in Windows, but it seems like VLC doesn't come with icons, so my files now look as if they were unassigned... ugly.

you can

Really? Can you tell me where can I do this? I've been searching for this but can't find it.

Download the installer...
Run the installer...

Select the option to associate vlc with the filetypes you want...

Install finished... :P

And it worked!

Cool!, then I guess my thread is still valid. VLC should have the file association inside the Preferences so that you don't have to run the installer for it.

Thanks a lot for the tip!

I extracted a VLC player to a folder, so VLC become portable player. Why i should download, start installer - I DON'T NEED TO DO THIS! IT'S VERY BAD! SH!T! Make please option in program options to set file type assotiations!

[edit by moderator]Removed annoying formatting[/edit]

OMG ! Stop using big colored text.

We won't do that since the user interface is cross platform ... and file associations are OS specific.

[edit by moderator]Removed annoying formatting[/edit]

Than you van make a standalone exe file, that writes file assotiations in the registry! Because i really don't use installers and i don't like them! It's a very Bad idea with installers by Bill Gates!

I !!! LOVE !!! PORTABLE APPLICATIONS!

I forgot to mention that user contributions are always welcome (none of the devs use Windows so they usually don't make windows only things in VLC)

so i really have to download it again???

selecting file associations without reusing the installer would be great. other programs can do this also in that way

I understand and accept the creators' approach to keep os dependent code out of the main program.
But sometimes other Windows programs steal the file association and I already experienced that normal users won't get it to reinstall VLC just to recreate the file associations.

The first and simplest solution is to provide a settings branch called "File associations" and tell the user to re-use the installer for it.
This way even dumb users will know the solution immediately and you won't get that many posts in the forums.
The installer should then remember all the selected settings, otherwise normal users will only concentrate on the affected file associations and don't take a look at the other settings.

A more sophisticated solution would be an extra program to set the file associations seperately.
Maybe there is a possibility for an installer option just to handle the file associations. This way no new program would be needed.
And a link in the start menu group would make the solution quite obvious.

Regards and thanks for such a great tool
Matthias "Maddes" Bücher

Hint: Just go to your VLC Start menu and pick "Reset VLC defaults and quit."

This will reset all file associations to what you picked when you first installed VLC. However, I assume this is a scattershot solution, since if you've set any other preferences, it will change them back too. If you've made special changes that would take time to do again, think twice, I guess. But at least it's faster than reinstalling the program.

l8r!

err ... that won't reset file associations. sorry

I concur. We *need* this ability ASAP. Learn from fubar2000, they have a very similar interface.

I understand wanting to keep the code platform independent. File associations are pretty trivial in Win32. A couple of ways to incorporate them into your codebase and still keep it platform independent...

1 - Preprocessor Macros (#ifdef/#define/#endif) the Win32 code so that it builds the feature for the target platform.

2 - Incorporate platform plugins somehow, although that would be a bitch to figure out.

3 - Seperate utility that comes with VLC titled "Platform Manager." This way, other developers could easily modify the app independent of the player codebase. Since you guys don't use Win32 as a primary development platform, this would make it easier for other developers to contribute without having to rummage through your source.

We're still waiting for a patch ... no one in the team has time to code that (even though i agree that adding/deleting/changing registry keys is trivial)

Hi there,

I can whip up a small tool to create the desired file type associations. All I'd need is a list of the associations the installer creates. Where can I find that? I just came here because a friend of mine asked how to associate his media files with VLC so I didn't look around a lot. I thought asking right away might be faster and less hassle

Best regards,
OldGrumpy

Sorry, forgot to log in before posting

You can have a look at the installer config file here:
http://trac.videolan.org/vlc/browser/tr ... n32.nsi.in

Wow, it does more than I expected But it's rather easy to whip up a small tool to manipulate the reg entries. at first I thought I could just strip down the installer to just set the reg keys but then again, that's not as flexible as I'd like it to be
I'll post again as soon as I have a first version to collect suggestions

right click on the filetype U want to associate with VLC. Click on open with, Click on Choose program, select VLC and check the "Always use the ...".

That's the best way I know.

Amir Yahyavi
http://ce.aut.ac.ir/~yahyavi

With Windows all you have to do is find a file who's file type you would like to associate with vlc right click, hover or click open with, then click choose program...Select VLC and check make default application.

Here is the Solution:

viewtopic.php?p=77705#77705