How to open my cmap without opening first the Views window ?

[pascollin]

I'm working on one specific map. Each time I want to edit it, I need to:
1- launch CmapTools
2- open the my cmap
3- close Views window (I don't need it)

I would like to open my cmap directly, with a command line like "cmaptools %1" where %1 is my cmap name or path.

Thanks
Pascal

[rcarvajal]

@pascollin:

I would like to open my cmap directly, with a command line like "cmaptools %1" where %1 is my cmap name or path.

You need CmapTools v5.03 in order to be able to double-click a ".cmap" file and runs CmapTools or do something like you had suggested. Still, the Views Window will be open among the concept map.

[maxand]

This is exactly the problem I face and unfortunately rcarvajal's answer is unhelpful.

Basically, I have a number of cmaps, and I want to be able to open each map **directly** from Windows Explorer (within CmapTools, of course) by double-clicking it or by creating a link to it from another application. That's not the problem. The problem is that when I try doing this, I get the External Viewer window, plus another popup window message that says:

Allow CmapTools to request the operating system to
open the file
file:////C:/DOCUME~1/[username]/MYDOCU~1/MYCMAP~1/TEST2~1.CMA?
It is recommended that only files from trusted
sources be opened this way.

The only answers are Yes and No. If I click No I get the viewer window. If I click yes, the nuisance popup disappears but returns a second later and I can't get rid of it. I just want to bypass the viewer so that NO FURTHER INPUT BY ME IS REQUIRED for it to open in CmapTools. Unless I can do this, I can't use CmapTools because I cannot link a single map to another application.

Please help me. This is driving me crazy. Is there some permission I need to check or something else I can tweak to make it work? If you don't understand what I am trying to say I will gladly try to make it clearer, but it should be clear enough. This is called the "document-centric" approach. If I click a .txt file, it opens in Notepad. Why doesn't a .cmap file open directly in CmapTools without needing the viewer? Can I disable the viewer?

I'm running v5.03 on Windows XP SP2 with administrator privileges.

Thanks for your help.

[maxand]

It seems that I can't edit a post once I've submitted it so I'll just add that I've even tried creating a shortcut with the cmap added as a parameter, e.g.,

"C:\Program Files\IHMC CmapTools\bin\CmapTools.exe" "C:\Documents and Settings\[username]\My Documents\My Cmaps\Test1.cmap"

but even this doesn't work! It's hopeless. All I want to do is open a specific map in CmapTools in one step. The "External Viewer" popup won't allow it. I've tried deleting CmapLauncher but that doesn't work either.

[maxand]

Hi, it's 6 months later and still v5.03. My problem is still that I can't double-click on a .cmap file from Explorer (or any other application) and have CmapTools open it for me without having to take the extra step of selecting it from all the other .cmap files I've already created. In other words, CmapTools does not appear to be document-centric, as most other Windows applications are.

I might as well not bother with trying to open any particular map but just go to the main application and select the map from there, but that's not what I want to do, because I want to put a *shortcut* to the cmap file in another application and open it from that application. Or have a list of shortcuts to the most frequently accessed cmap files and click them directly from Windows Start Menu.

I can do this with MindManager files, in fact just about any other file. Why not Cmap?

If I already have 200 cmap files, how long will it take me to find the one I want, **each** time? This severely limits the usefulness of an otherwise excellent application.

Please, am I doing something wrong or is everyone else getting this hassle? I would like to get some more feedback from other members about this.

[stevewalsh]

I have found that after you open the first cmap, you can close the Viewer down and then just click on the *.cmap to open it without the Viewer. It seems like if you have one open cmap on your desktop, the others do not need the Viewer to open. (I have made Windows aware that the default program to open cmaps is CmapTools.)

[lbunch]

I think there are two separate issues here.
First, when CmapTools is launched it opens the Views window. There isn't an option to start the application without opening the Views.
Second is the issue of CmapTools failing to open a cmap from the desktop, web, or email attachment. On Windows, the CmapTools installer configures the registry to use CmapLauncher.exe to open '.cmap' files. Note that CmapTools.exe does not perform this function. You can right-click on a .cmap file, select 'Open With...', and choose CmapLaucher.exe. This only works with version 5.x.

[lbunch]

The warning message

Allow CmapTools to request the operating system to open the file file:////C:/DOCUME~1/[username]/MYDOCU~1/MYCMAP~1/TEST2~1.CMA?

is due to the fact that the file ends in '.CMA' and not '.cmap'. CmapTools only recognizes the .cmap extension.

[ScottyDM]

When I saw lbunch's post and his quote of maxand's original post, I realized I'd seen this exact problem in an different Java-based software product.

I too had maxand's problem. I have two Windows 2000 Pro machines: a desktop and a notebook. The problem was on the notebook only, and it went away when I logged into the Windows domain rather than running the notebook stand-alone. I didn't take the time to carefully read my error popup, but now that I see maxand's I think I can shed some insight into the root cause of the problem.

Look at this path: file:////C:/DOCUME~1/[username]/MYDOCU~1/MYCMAP~1/TEST2~1.CMA

It's in legacy DOS 8.3 format. Here's a Wiki article about the 8.3 filename format for those who aren't sure what I mean.

Modern Windows (newer than 15 years old) stores your pretty filenames, but it also stores a legacy 8.3 filename should you have a need to run some really ancient software.

What I saw with this other app that's Java-based (as Cmap is), is that when you opened a file by the method pascollin wants to use, sometimes it would see the pretty filenames and sometimes it would see the legacy 8.3 names. This came and went with each minor revision of the software, but it's independent of the Java revision. More accurately, with the Java revision I currently have, I installed several revisions of the app and it each rev has its own unique behavior -- that is, some always see your nice filenames and others always see legacy filenames. For this particular app it only happened at startup, and the symptoms are quite a bit different than with Cmap, but the commonality is Java and legacy 8.3 filenames.

I'm not a Java programmer (I've been dabbling in PHP and Java Script), so I can only guess. My guess is that the Java function that gets stuff like path and filename from the O.S. has several different variants. And that how each variant acts is somewhat dependent on the underlying O.S. (as is true with PHP). So whoever coded the Cmap modules that use this function (or I guess that'd be class) picked a variant that doesn't always work right in Windows. Perhaps they've chosen that particular variant because it seems to be consistent across all tested platforms.

Anyway, the solution is to find the how and when the underlying Java class gives you the wrong path/filename, and figure out which class, or how to use the class, so that it always gives you the right data. The key is to realize that legacy 8.3 filenames are a massive headache and wrong for any modern app.

Avoid 8.3.

Thanks.

S~

[lo7383]

Hi any idea of how doing that in Linux ? Tx