KIO

KDE Input / Output ( KIO ) is an asynchronous virtual file system dar. Virtual means that the data user (client) a unified programming interface ( API) is available, it is no matter what method actually accessed the data. For each of these methods, which are communication protocols such as HTTP, FTP, SSH, WebDAV, POP3, IMAP, Bluetooth and many more, there is a specific KIO slave available which performs the necessary protocol conversion for the uniform interface. Various archive types such as tar, cpio, and zip as well as different local sources (audio CD, USB stick, ...) can be handled.

Purpose

The basic idea of this concept is that, for the handling of each newly added upcoming protocol for its use, a separate new client is to write, which it dominates. By Kio - slave concept, it is sufficient to develop and register a further Kio - slave. This then provides information about the virtual file system a uniform file access for KDE application without them having to know anything about the actual operation. Konqueror, Dolphin and other KDE applications can access ... without having to take into account a difference to the usual files or need to know this in the interaction based on this API, for example, on network shares or devices ( Bluetooth). For the user, this results in often to perform efficient and convenient ways to be the same, most complex work, for example on the console.

Application Examples

Convert tracks on the audio CD to Ogg Vorbis

With Konqueror in a sub-window, the pseudo - URI :/ audiocd enter. Then you see the contents of the audio CD. There is a subdirectory Ogg / whose contents are simply copied to a directory on the hard disk. The audio CD KIO slave automatically does the conversion while copying. Analogously, this also works for converting to WAV or other container formats / file formats.