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The default vifmrc file on OS X expects MplayerX to be installed. I personally use mpv instead, and I believe it makes for a better default because it supports most major platforms and is becoming somewhat standard. The problem is that vifm doesn't resort to other programs (such as QuickTime or mpv) when it notices that MplayerX is not available.

Is this behavior intentional? Vifm would greatly improve its portability if it handled cases of missing programs cleverly, because you could use the same configuration file for every system.

1 Answer

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Shouldn't vifm try to open with the next program when the first one is not installed?

It already does. I would say that the problem here is with OS X, i.e., the command is

open -a MPlayerX.app,

the application in this case is open and that's all Vifm checks for existence. I'm not sure if it's possible to rewrite open -a something in a normal way to fix the behaviour. If it were

MPlayerX.app,

then everything would work, but I'm not sure whether OS X allows this. So you need to put normal applications (by "normal" I mean not .app-things) before open -a ....

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With open -a MplayerX.app, and open -a MplayerX, I get

Unable to find application named 'MplayerX.app'
Press return ...

If I replace it with MPlayerX, it works, but it does not open in a new window.

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New window of what? I didn't use mpv, so either it needs some command-line argument or you want to spawn a new terminal window with mpv running in it (have no idea which command does this in OS X, in GNU/Linux it's something like xterm -- mpv).

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