Launching DOS apps under Netscape

[Bill Pardue]

We've managed to "trick" Netscape into launching our CD-ROM apps 
locally.   The idea is to make it think that the CD software is a 
"helper app" for launching  a dummy file type.

 It takes a few steps and doesn't work with every program 
(we couldn't get it to work with Encarta) and utilizes the fact that 
most cd-rom applications don't recognize any extensions on the 
command line (such as file names).  Here are the steps:

1) Create a 1-character text file (it has to have some content)  with a three-letter
extension not reserved for any other program (e.g.--"ntdb.cdx").

2) Go into the Netscape "helper apps" dialog and select "create new 
type."

3) For the new type dialog box, enter "application" for the mime type 
and "cdx" for the mime subtype.  Hit "OK."

4) Next, enter "cdx" in the file extension box.

5) For the Action option, select "Launch Application" and enter the 
path/filename of the CD you want to run.

This is more or less equivalent to entering the program on the 
command line with a file for it to try and open.  Something like:

"c:\ntdb\ntdb.exe   ntdb.cdx"

You have to go through this setup, creating a new dummy file 
extension and and helper app association for every CD you'd like to 
be able to launch.  I think we have file extensions running from 
"*.cda" to "*.cds" for all our discs.

Since most CD-ROM software ignores any such input, the program should 
just start up with no problem.  However, some programs (like Encarta) 
do recognize some additions to the command line and may return an 
error message.  We haven't figured a way around that one.

It's certainly not the most elegant solution, but for the most part, 
it's worked quite well for us.  Good luck!

--Bill Pardue

PS (Let me bring up another issue--one of the other reasons we can do 
this is because we're running one version of our web site off the 
LAN, which is merely accessed as local files by Netscape.  Obviously, 
these links aren't on the Internet version of the web site running 
off the university server.  This means that you have to maintain a 
slightly different web site in-house than you do on the Internet.  
Also, since the setup also requires configuring the client software 
just right, keep in mind that either every copy of netscape you've 
got running is going to have to have it's helper apps configured 
correctly, or you should have a single copy of netscape.ini that gets 
updated and then copied over to the various machines by your server.)

********************************************
Bill Pardue, Electronic Resources Librarian
          Paul V. Galvin Library
      Illinois Institute of Technology
pardue at charlie.acc.iit.edu     312-567-3615
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