I&#39;d vote then for that behavior, then. While not ideal, its&#39; at least consistent... at least on the command line. How will it be used anyway? Most likely to view only a handful of files anyway. Then any files opened afterwards in the instance would be normal... or maybe have a File -&gt; Open Read Only option?  If one needs to open further non-read only files then could use the new menu option.  Just my 2c.<br /><br />-Tim<br /><br />&gt; Vim - Only accepts posix options, ie they apply to all, once open vim<br />&gt; further files appear not to be effected unless vim started as view<br />&gt; gedit - no readonly option<br />&gt; kate - don&#39;t know, I run gnome and kate online docs appears broken (blank<br />&gt; page)<br />&gt; ooo - appears to apply to all files, doesn&#39;t effect files opened afterwards<br />&gt; <br />&gt; Poorly documented but mostly similar<br />&gt; <br />&gt; Cheers<br />&gt; Lex