Mac OS X in a Nutshell

Name

open

Synopsis

open file
open [-a application] file
open [-e] file
                  

The open command can be used to open files and directories, and to launch applications from the Terminal application.

Options

-a application

Uses application to open the file.

-e file

Forces the use of Mac OS X’s TextEdit application to open the specified file.

Examples

To open a directory in the Finder, use open, followed by the name of the directory. For example, to open the current directory, type:

                     open .

To open your /Public directory:

                     open ~/Public

To open the /Applications directory:

                     open /Applications

To open an application, you need only its name. For example, you can open Project Builder (/Developer/Applications) with this command:

                     open -a "Project Builder"

Note

You are not required to enter the path for the application — only its name—even if it is a Classic application. The only time you are required to enter the path is if you have two different versions of applications with similar names on your system.

You can also supply a filename argument with the -a option, which launches the application and open the specified file with that application. You can use this option to open a file with something other than the application with which it’s associated. For example, to open an XML file in Project Builder instead of the default text editor, TextEdit, you could use the following command:

                     open -a "Project Builder" data.xml

To open multiple files, you can use wildcards:

                     open *.c

To force a file to be opened with ...