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Using KDE dialogs in Firefox and Thunderbird

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

As you may have guessed I use both Linux (Debian) and Firefox at work and home. Within Debian I use the KDE desktop and for some time it has bugged me no end that firefox (and Thunderbird for that matter) use the GTK dialogs (as used in GNOME. Now there's nothing wrong with these per-se but what bugs me is that I choose to use KDE and therefore pretty much all my desktop applications use the typical KDE open, save and print dialog boxes - except Firefox and thunderbird and try as I might I couldn't find a way to switch them over....
Until now...
Kde - How To: integrate Firefox with KDE - Ubuntu Forums
That is a link to a Ubuntu forum (Ubuntu is another Linx distribution based on Debian) which explains how to get firefox to use the KDE dialogs. It works a treat and can be transposed to Thunderbird as well.
For those who don't want to hop over there - or in case the post isappears in the future, here's the relevant details...

1. Find the system-wide firefox components directory. For Debian it is /usr/lib/firefox/components.


2. Edit the file called nsFilePicker.js in that directory (you may need to be root)


3. Find the following piece of code
   
   

   compMgr.registerFactoryLocation(FILEPICKER_CID,
                                       "FilePicker JS Component",
   // *really long comment here*
                                       "",
   // *really long comment here*
                                       fileSpec,
                                       location,
                                       type);
   



4. Edit it to look like this
   
   

   
   compMgr.registerFactoryLocation(FILEPICKER_CID,
                                       "FilePicker JS Component",
   // *really long comment here*
                                       FILEPICKER_CONTRACTID,
   // *really long comment here*
                                       fileSpec,
                                       location,
                                       type);
   



5. Save the file


6. You'll now need to refresh the firefox chrome registry which is easiest done by installing or removing an Extension (Look under the tools menu) and restarting firefox.