[thelist] hrefs that pass info to applications

[Sorgatz, Rex]

I've noticed lately a few applications that provide a linking mechanism with
HREFs. For example:

<a href="aim:goim?screenname=ibsrex&amp;message=Hi+Rex.">Click me to launch
an AOL Instant Messenger window to a given screen name.</a>

The mechanism works similar to <a href="mailto:...>.

Here's another one:

<a href="nap:search?artist=Mogwai&amp;title=Rock+Action">Search for Mogwai's
"Rock Action" on Napster</a>

So, "aim" launches AOL-IM and "nap" launches Napster -- does anyone know of
a resource that lists others? (I tried using "msn" to see if I could get it
to launch Microsoft's Messenger -- no go.) Is passing variables through a
string directly to an application common in other ways that I've never
encountered? The phenomena is causing me think of interesting
possibilities...

Any thoughts?

-Rex