Org-protocol allows you to write links in the browser and open Emacs when you click the link. After the Emacs side is set up, running emacsclient org-protocol://handler?key=value will pass (:key "value") to the function that is registered for handler. But the browser still does not recognize the link.
Org-roam's documentation explains a set up that is more in depth (and also covers macOS and Windows). But I didn't want to create a new .desktop file, so this is how I did it.
One way to set up org-protocol:// links on Linux, assuming you want to use emacsclient -c for Emacs in general:
- Copy
/usr/share/applications/emacs.desktopto~/.local/share/applications/emacs.desktop, where it will shadow the system-wide file. Change
Exec=from "emacs %F" to "emacsclient -c %U"- We use %U to get URLs, instead of just files, to allow
org-protocol://links. See also: the definition of %U and other field codes in the Desktop Entry Specification. - It seems to continue to open files just fine, though if the desktop passed a file:// link to Emacs it will fail.
- We use %U to get URLs, instead of just files, to allow
- Add "x-scheme-handler/org-protocol;" to the end of MimeType
- Wait a bit for it to take effect
- Try opening an org-protocol:// link again from, say, Firefox. It should now ask you whether you want to open this link with Emacs.
Resulting ~/.local/share/applications/emacs.desktop:
#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open
[Desktop Entry]
Name=Emacs
GenericName=Text Editor
Comment=Edit text
MimeType=text/english;text/plain;text/x-makefile;text/x-c++hdr;text/x-c++src;text/x-chdr;text/x-csrc;text/x-java;text/x-moc;text/x-pascal;text/x-tcl;text/x-tex;application/x-shellscript;text/x-c;text/x-c++;x-scheme-handler/org-protocol;
Exec=emacsclient -c %U
Icon=emacs
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Categories=Development;TextEditor;
StartupWMClass=Emacs
Keywords=Text;Editor;