How to make difference between .wxm (wxMaxima) and .c files in Linux Mint?

Question

I installed wxMaxima on my laptop a few days ago.

The issue is that files with the extension .wxm, that are used with wxMaxima, are identified as a C source files. Therefore, when I double click on such a file, it opens my text editor.

I tried right clicking on a .wxm file, and changing the default program — but that also changed the default program for .c extensions — something I don't want to happen.

The bottom line: how do I define .wxm extension to be of a different type than .c extensions?

Answer 1

Important: I suppose that your desktop environment or file manager runs a program based on file mime type.

Interestingly, my file command returned ASCII C program text for .wxm file. Definitly, this was not correct, and I have corrected this in the following way:

Suppose your home directory is /home/user

1. Create /home/user/.magic with the following contents:

   0       string  /*\ [wxMaxima\ batch\ file      wxMaxima batch file
   !:mime  text/x-wxmaxima-batch
   

2. Compile magic by running file -C -m /home/user/.magic — it will create /home/user/.magic.mgc file

3. Check that file command works as expected:

   user@host$ file wxmaxima_file.wxm
   wxmaxima_file.wxm: wxMaxima batch file
   user@host$ file -i wxmaxima_file.wxm
   wxmaxima_file.wxm: text/x-wxmaxima-batch; charset=us-ascii
   

4. Set up your desktop environment or file manager to run wxMaxima based on text/x-wxmaxima-batch mime type. (The precise way how to do this depends on such a desktop environment or file manager. So if you do not know such a details, you may ask another question.)