[anal_reactor]

> The idea of the last part of the filename (after the period) determining what program is launched to handle the file is odd anyway...

I challenge you to suggest a better solution - the best that Linux came up with is a giant database of all magic numbers known to God and praying that something matches... sometimes it does, and sometimes it even matches the correct program.

[nofriend]

the linux way works tho

[NooneAtAll3]

it really doesn't

hiding information from user is not good by any means

[netsharc]

But relying on them to tell the OS what type a file is, or allowing them to change the extension, isn't good either. lena.jpg doesn't become lena.pdf by changing the last 3 letters of the filename..

[tardedmeme]

It gets really complicated when you get into overlapping file types, like with ISOBMFF. An .mp4 can also, simultaneously, be a valid .3gp because those are profiles of ISOBMFF. On the other extreme, JPEG is secretly two different incompatible formats (JFIF and Exif), and a video file with a different codec in the same container, or even a different track layout, might as well be a different format.

[NooneAtAll3]

> allowing them to change the extension, isn't good either

why not?

power to the people. At worst it just breaks. At best you get filetype chamelions that are straight up cool, yet harmless

[nofriend]

Am I missing something? Hiding things from users is a property of the windows approach. Did you reply to the wrong person?

[NooneAtAll3]

GGP comment literally says that linux way is hiding file type in the binary information. If you consider that as more visible I have many questions

windows at least gets an option to display file type

[nofriend]

Some file formats, eg png, require a particular file header in order to be considered valid. This is true regardless of your operating system, be it windows or linux. If that is hidden information, then it is hidden regardless of which operating system you're on. On windows, if I have a png named .doc, then there is absolutely no way to determine that it is a valid png and could be opened with my image viewer with standard tools. On linux it will recommend you open the file with an image viewer regardless of the file extension. That seems to me like significantly less hidden information.

[anal_reactor]

> On windows, if I have a png named .doc, then there is absolutely no way to determine that it is a valid png

And that's a good thing. Imagine receiving a file called "very_funny_cat.png" and Linux realizing that while it's not a valid PNG image, it is a valid ELF executable.