Add BitCoin URI handling entries automatically #1110

The URI would be a great way to make the payments easier.

Unfortunately after installing the client the user needs to set up all the protocol handlers manually. This needs technical knowledge which the potentially mainstream user doesn't have.

It would be great to do these steps for the user during installation or at the first start of the client.

Windows has a common place to set these at Control Panel/Default Programs/Set Associations (Vista), but all the major browsers have their own methods as well.

More info: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Register_protocol http://ecdsa.org/bitcoin_URIs.html

I haven't tested those methods yet, but I can confirm that after installing and starting the BitCoin Client 0.6, none of the following browsers could handle BitCoin URIs: Chrome 18.0, Firefox 9.0.1, Firefox 10.0.2, Firefox 11.0 and IE 9.0.

Should URI work on the mac? Never has for me. That would be a big step in the right direction. Currently handling payment is not smooth at all. It would be ideal, if clicking the Bitcoin address would open the bitcoin client and insert the clicked address into the receiving field.

My thoughts exactly. The URI definition (http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/BIP_0021) is complete enough to make the label (name of the receiver), receiving address, bitcoin amount, message and other future parameters pre-filled in the client.

URI handling is currently only active for Linux-style OSes.

Ok, so is there an existing ticket for URI implementation on OS X?

I was working on the Windws part of this some time ago, but it was considered not perfect. For Mac this is a todo-comment in the source.

ok thx for the info. so I can't subscribe to any ticket :(

talked to sipa via IRC, he said it should be coming soon. I think this is very important and should be rather high on the priority list.

maybe you can update this ticket once it is implemented? That would allow me and others to get a notification.

Windows URI handling was disabled prior to 0.6, as it was considered unstable and would have had to be added late in the development cycle. It is enabled for all non-Windows and non-OSX builds, but you have to register the protocol handlers manually unless you use some form of automated installation (such as the bitcoin ppa on Ubuntu).
Windows will hopefully be re-added for 0.7. OSX is unlikely to happen unless some Mac developer steps up and does it (if its even possible to do easily in C++, which, based on the very brief searching I did, it is not). Because OSX uses its own over-complicated URI handling methods which do not mach the standard ones that both Linux and Windows use, it needs someone who knows how to do it to add it.

Closing this, it was fixed in version 0.7 I believe. I just implemented bitcoin: URI handling on OSX, that should be in the-release-after-0.8.

Hi Gavin, not sure I understand. 0.8.0 does not have URI support yet, but it's in the code already and will be in 0.8.1? Could you elaborate?

The next includes-new-features release (which may or may not be called "0.8.1") will include support for bitcoin: URIs on OSX.

Great :) Thanks for clarifying.

http://www.ambience.sk/how-to-add-bitcoin-uri-to-firefox/

0.8.3 brings this functionality. Glad to see this finally happening and working on OS X.

If this is fixed @andrasfuchs can you please close the issue?

I tested only on Windows, but I got the following error after clicking on the bitcoin URL: "Cannot obtain a lock on data directory C:\Users\Andras\AppData\Roaming\Bitcoin. Bitcoin is probably already running."

After this, I quit the client and tried again. I work perfectly. Tried again while the client was running, and worked again.

So, the most likely cause of the problem was that when I first started the client, it was not synchronized, and I clicked the url while it was still doing the synchronization.

Repo: 1, Purge your cache 2, Run the client, and let it start the synchronization 3, Click on any bitcoin URI 4, You'll get the locking error