How to support Finder preview pane for new application file types

[rhoge at nmr.mgh.harvard.edu (Rick Hoge)]

> I don't think you can customize Finder so that your file shows 
> different fields. I assume you're not asking about how Name, Size, 
> Created, and Modified are genereated -- Kind once came from the 'kind' 
> resource but now would be from the application's property list.

Thanks - it didn't really look like it was do-able.

>> I remember something about this being handled by QuickTime, but I 
>> can't find this reference...
>
> Maybe <http://developer.apple.com/qa/qtmcc/qtmcc10.html>, the 'pnot' 
> resource?

Hmm.  Yes this is what I must have seen.  I also found out you can set 
a file's icon by copying an image to the pasteboard and pasting it into 
the icon box in the "get info" window.  Opening the file with ResFool 
shows a newly created resource fork with a resource named icns (the 
image).  Even being able to set this programatically on file save would 
be quite useful.  I'm sure this involves the Carbon API (my app is 
Cocoa thus far but had to use Carbon to implement some Help 
extensions).  I guess the resource fork is also something Apple's 
deprecating.

Would be great to get *something* like this working as our scientific 
app involves creation of a lot of data files that can be tedious to 
keep track of.  Will probably write some kind of custom browser (like 
Photoshop's browser) but if there was a way to get this "for free" in 
the finder it would be huge for us.

Thanks again,

Rick