UPDATE-DESKTOP-DATABASE(1) User Commands UPDATE-DESKTOP-DATABASE(1)

NAME

update-desktop-database - Build cache database of MIME types handled
by desktop files

SYNOPSIS

update-desktop-database [-q|--quiet] [-v|--verbose] [DIRECTORY...]

DESCRIPTION

The update-desktop-database program is a tool to build a cache
database of the MIME types handled by desktop files.

The cache database contains the list of MIME types that can be
handled by desktop files, as well as, for each MIME type, a list of
desktop files that can handle this MIME type. This cache database
ease the work of applications that need to find an application that
can open a document of a specific MIME type: those applications will
not have to parse all the desktop files existing on the system, and
can instead parse this cache database.

If no DIRECTORY is specified as argument, the desktop files that will
be processed are the ones installed in $XDG_DATA_DIRS/applications.

If both the --quiet and --verbose options are used, then --verbose
will be ignored.

OPTIONS

The following options are supported:

-q, --quiet
Do not display any information about processing and updating
progress.

-v, --verbose
Display more information about processing and updating
progress.

NOTES

If an invalid MIME type is met, it will be ignored and the creation
of the cache database will continue.

The format of the cache database is a simple desktop entry format,
with a MIME Cache group, containing one key per MIME type. The key
name is the MIME type, and the key value is the list of desktop file
that can handle this MIME type.

The order of the desktop files found for a MIME type is not
significant. Therefore, an external mechanism must be used to
determine what is the preferred desktop file for a MIME type.

EXAMPLE

Here is a simple example of a cache database:

[MIME Cache]
application/x-shellscript=gedit.desktop;
text/plain=gedit.desktop;gvim.desktop;
video/webm=totem.desktop;

This cache database is created with three desktop files, each
containing a MimeType key:

gedit.desktop: MimeType=text/plain;application/x-shellscript;
gvim.desktop: MimeType=text/plain;
totem.desktop: MimeType=video/webm;

FILES

$XDG_DATA_DIRS/applications/mimeinfo.cache

This file is the cache database created by update-desktop-
database.

BUGS

If you find bugs in the update-desktop-database program, please
report these on https://bugs.freedesktop.org.

FREEDESKTOP.ORG UPDATE-DESKTOP-DATABASE(1)