Re: Guessing based on file extension

[Alan Shutko <ats@acm.org>]

Hans de Graaff <graaff@xs4all.nl> writes:

> If application/octet-stream is all we have then gussing may be the
> best way to go. Perhaps we could save the first part of the file and
> run it through 'file' to see what kind of file it really is? That
> would be more foolproof at least than only looking at the file
> extension.

On my system, both Word documents and Excel documents turn up as
"Microsoft Office Document"s in file, but I want to use different
programs to view them.  (On other Unix systems, they don't tend to
have anything meaningful turn up in file.)

Given that it's usually Microsoft OS programs which say everything is
application/octet-stream, and all _they_ do upon receiving the
document is look at the file extension, I don't see a major problem
with doing the same thing.  (I mean, they don't even look at the
content-type when it _is_ meaningful.)

-- 
Alan Shutko <ats@acm.org> - In a variety of flavors!
In most instances, all an argument proves is that two people are present.