How to open an external application from the Firefox add-on? (Example: default text editor)

Question

I need my addon that can edit some files using an external tool. Any ideas?

Answer 1

This fragment shows or runs the file if there is a path:

var localFile = Cc["@mozilla.org/file/local;1"].createInstance(Ci.nsILocalFile); localFile.initWithPath("C:\\some-directory\\some-file.png"); if(localFile.exists()){ // localFile.reveal(); // open the containing folder of the file // localFile.launch(); // launch the file } 

However, you may need to use nsIProcess to run the executable with the parameters (for example, the path to the file you are trying to open with the executable).

 var exeFile = Cc["@mozilla.org/file/local;1"].createInstance(Ci.nsILocalFile); exeFile.initWithPath("C:\\Program Files\\...\\app.exe"); var parameter="C:\\some-directory\\some-file.txt"; if(exeFile.exists()){ var process = Cc["@mozilla.org/process/util;1"].createInstance(Ci.nsIProcess); process.init(exeFile); process.run(false,[parameter],1); // launch the executable with another file as parameter. } 

Documentation:

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/XPCOM_Interface_Reference/nsIFile https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/XPCOM_Interface_Reference/nsILocalFile https://developer.mozilla.org/en- US / docs / XPCOM_Interface_Reference / nsIProcess https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Code_snippets/File_I_O