Default viewer script

This script can be used to view files for which no viewer is registered. It has some convenience features like:

• displaying only beginning of a file, so that huge files are processed at the same speed as the small ones;
• converting text files to system encoding;
• displaying binary files as a hex dump.

Source code

#!/bin/bash

if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]; then
    echo "Usage: $0 filename"
    exit 1
fi

# upper limit of lines to display for text files
nlines=150
# upper limit of bytes to display for binary files
nbytes=2048
# language of text files
language=russian
# output encoding for text files
encoding=utf-8

info=$(head -$nlines "$1" | file --mime -)
charset=${info#*=}

if [ "x$charset" == "xbinary" ]; then
    hexdump -e '"%08_ax: "' -e '8/1 "%02x " "  " 8/1 "%02x "' -e '" |" 16/1 "%_p"' -e '"\n"' -v -n $nbytes "$1"
else
    head -$nlines "$1" | enconv -g -L $language -x $encoding
fi

The script uses:

1. head utility to process only first $nlines of file.
2. file tool to determine whether file is of binary format or not.
3. hexdump tool to display binary files in classic hex dump form.
4. enconv program for automatic conversion to the $encoding charset for text files trying to guess source encoding of $language.

Plugging the script into Vifm

To use it in Vifm:

1. Save the script as defviewer at one of directories listed in your $PATH environment variable or under $VIFM/scripts (most likely that it's ~/.vifm/scripts).
2. On Unix-like operating systems make the script file executable by running
   chmod +x defviewer
3. Add the following line to your vifmrc:
   fileview * defviewer %c

Usage

• In quick view activated via :view command.
• In explore mode activated via e normal mode key.

Here is what it looks like for a binary file in explore mode:

Possible improvements

• Use mguesser to automatically determine language and encoding of text files.