Mac: MuseScore assigned .md file extension to itself. Any way to change this back to markdown?

• May 5, 2020 - 19:14

Hello!

After installing the latest available MuseScore (3.4.2) to Catalina 10.15.4, I noticed, that some of the apps, which are working with markdown files are giving an errors. It turns out, that during install MuseScore silently changed the .md file association from markdown to MuseData file.

Is there a way to revert this to default association?

Here is what I see in terminal after running mdls tool (see screenshot).

Attachment	Size
Скриншот 2020-05-05 21.11.37.png	288.04 KB

Comments

[DELETED] 1831606

• May 5, 2020 - 19:36

Didn't do it for me. My foobar.md file opened in XCode as markdown.

Valery_Kondakoff

• May 5, 2020 - 19:46

The problem is not with choosing an application which opens .md-files. I can associate md-files with my preferred text editor as well. But MuseScore changed the kMDItemKind of .md files: instead of "Text file" it is now "MuseData File" - so it is not counted as a text file anymore.

Please, try to run 'mdls foobar.md' in Terminal. What is your kMDItemKind value?

Thanks!

[DELETED] 1831606

• May 5, 2020 - 19:57

kMDItemFSSize = 7
kMDItemFSTypeCode = ""
kMDItemInterestingDate_Ranking = 2020-05-05 00:00:00 +0000
kMDItemKind = "MultiMarkdown Text Document"
kMDItemLastUsedDate = 2020-05-05 18:36:29 +0000
kMDItemLastUsedDate_Ranking = 2020-05-05 00:00:00 +0000
kMDItemLogicalSize = 7

But I guess I installed the "MultiMarkdown" editor more recently than MuseScore 3.

Valery_Kondakoff

• May 5, 2020 - 20:27

Thank you. I reinstalled Visual Studio Code and now I see "Visual Studio Code document" as kMDItemKind for .md files, but the issue is still there: for example, md-files are not included in search result if I search files by 'Kind: text' criteria.

Any chance some of the devs to take a look at this issue?

Jojo-Schmitz

• May 5, 2020 - 20:38

Please report it in the issue tracker

Valery_Kondakoff

• May 5, 2020 - 21:24

Done!

Jojo-Schmitz

• May 5, 2020 - 21:34

Thanks for #304972: MuseScore changes kMDItemContentTypeTree and kMDItemContentType of markdown files during installation (Mac)

[DELETED] 1831606

• May 5, 2020 - 22:08

If I may ask, what the diminished-seventh is a "musedata file"?

Valery_Kondakoff

• May 5, 2020 - 22:12

Here is what I have found by googling: "MuseData is a format developed by Walter B. Hewlett beginning in 1983 as an early means of sharing music notation between software. It has since been eclipsed by MusicXML, but several thousand scores in this format are still available online."

https://musescore.org/en/handbook/2/file-formats#musedata

Valery_Kondakoff

• May 6, 2020 - 10:42

BTW, this 'truncated' mdls output means, that Spotlight indexes need to be rebuild. Here are the instructions: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201716 (if you like to see the full info).

[DELETED] 1831606

• May 6, 2020 - 13:44

Why do you infer that it means that? I have never had to rebuild spotlight indices before.

Valery_Kondakoff

• May 6, 2020 - 13:54

Because the mdls output is not full. I saw this yesterday. If you rebuild the Spotlight index you will see the full output. Something like this:

 /Users/valerykondakoff/Downloads/test.md 
_kMDItemDisplayNameWithExtensions      = "test.md"
kMDItemContentCreationDate             = 2020-05-05 17:44:51 +0000
kMDItemContentCreationDate_Ranking     = 2020-05-05 00:00:00 +0000
kMDItemContentModificationDate         = 2020-05-05 17:55:53 +0000
kMDItemContentModificationDate_Ranking = 2020-05-05 00:00:00 +0000
kMDItemContentType                     = "net.daringfireball.markdown"
kMDItemContentTypeTree                 = (
    "net.daringfireball.markdown",
    "public.plain-text",
    "public.text",
    "public.data",
    "public.item",
    "public.content"
)
kMDItemDateAdded                       = 2020-05-05 17:44:51 +0000
kMDItemDateAdded_Ranking               = 2020-05-05 00:00:00 +0000
kMDItemDisplayName                     = "test.md"
kMDItemDocumentIdentifier              = 0
kMDItemFSContentChangeDate             = 2020-05-05 17:55:53 +0000
kMDItemFSCreationDate                  = 2020-05-05 17:44:51 +0000
kMDItemFSCreatorCode                   = ""
kMDItemFSFinderFlags                   = 0
kMDItemFSHasCustomIcon                 = 0
kMDItemFSInvisible                     = 0
kMDItemFSIsExtensionHidden             = 0
kMDItemFSIsStationery                  = 0
kMDItemFSLabel                         = 0
kMDItemFSName                          = "test.md"
kMDItemFSNodeCount                     = 4
kMDItemFSOwnerGroupID                  = 20
kMDItemFSOwnerUserID                   = 501
kMDItemFSSize                          = 4
kMDItemFSTypeCode                      = ""
kMDItemInterestingDate_Ranking         = 2020-05-06 00:00:00 +0000
kMDItemKind                            = "Markdown"
kMDItemLastUsedDate                    = 2020-05-06 09:16:22 +0000
kMDItemLastUsedDate_Ranking            = 2020-05-06 00:00:00 +0000
kMDItemLogicalSize                     = 4
kMDItemPhysicalSize                    = 4096
kMDItemUseCount                        = 1
kMDItemUsedDates                       = (
    "2020-05-05 21:00:00 +0000"
)

This is not necessary, though. JFYI!

[DELETED] 1831606

• May 6, 2020 - 13:57

I excerpted the output for you. I, not spotlight, am the culprit.

Valery_Kondakoff

• May 6, 2020 - 14:04

Ah, that's it! ;) So, no need to rebuild Spotlight index (this is harmless, though).

BTW, the most interesting part of mdls output is kMDItemContentType and kMDItemContentTypeTree. The system uses these two keys to choose what content kind of file it is: text, document, video etc.

[DELETED] 1831606

• May 6, 2020 - 14:07

Yes, I discovered that (as well as the md- command line tools) yesterday, thanks to you.