169077 - attachments will not open

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(MailNews Core :: Attachments, defect)

Description

[seth klein]

I am running mozilla build ID 2002082606 on a window 2000 service pack 3 box. 
I am able to read all email, however if someone sends me ANY attachment and I
try to open them using their correct application I get the following dialog box:
(microsoft word example):
you have chosen to download a file of type "Microsoft Word Document"
[application/msword] from

mailbox ......(my email account)

What should mozilla do with this file      

Choose ( a clickable box)

Advanced                Ok          Cancel (three boxes)

When i choose the correct application by clicking
the choose button and then clicking ok, the attachment won't open-->  nothing
happens when I then click ok

If i try the same with the Advanced option and then click ok 
nothing happens

I end up having to right click the attachment and select save as

Although this is minor it is an annoying bug and I thought you should know about it

Comment 1

[Jesse Moorman]

I'm having a similar problem on same W2K setup, but only on one of two machines.

On the malfunctioning machine, I cannot pass attachments to the appropriate
application, and they all have to be saved and then opened manually. I'm not
sure if this applies to ALL attachments, since it is not my personal machine,
but I keep getting complaints about it. Mozilla doesn't offer any choice except
where to save the file -- I cannot figure out how to open the attachments.

I've reported elsewhere on a bug in which file types could not be correctly
associated with the appropriate application, or file types were incorrectly
associated with an application. It may be related.

Comment 2

[Jesse Moorman]

My mistake. The malfunction just reported is under WinXP Home Edition, with SP
applied.

Comment 3

[Nils Bruechert]

Machine: Win 2k (5.0.2195), SP 1
Mozilla: Mozilla 1.3b, Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.3b)
Gecko/20030210

I seem to have the same problem as described in comment #1: 
Opening attachments from (POP-)Mails does not work. The Attachment is shown with
the correct icon (e.g. Mediaplayer for MPG, etc.), upon double click, the
"Opening [attachment]" dialog comes up. Only "Save as..." works fine, choosing
one of the other options (open with default application or open with... and
chosing the right app.) does not work. 
There is a slight pause and there seems to be a dialog (download manager?) or
error message popping up, but it disappears too quickly to be recognized.

Comment 4

[Nils Bruechert]

Sorry: Line 1 of comment #3 Should read: Machine: Win 2k (5.0.2195), SP 2

Comment 5

[Nils Bruechert]

I did some more testing and it comes down to this:
The behaviour I described in Comment #3 only happens with attachments that have
"Content Type: application/octet-stream" instead of a proper Content Type
Definition. I'm not sure if this can be fixed on the mozilla side or if it is a
bug in some mail clients (probably outlook [express]).

Comment 6

[Marian Hanzel]

This is true for 1.5 RC x. The1.4 and 1.5a works fine.
I installed the new 1.5RC1 and next the RC2 into my previous Mozilla1.4 folder.
(because of certificates, settings, mail structure ...)

After moving to 1.5RC's the Open attachment (also the leftclick on attachment)
functionality does not work.

It is possible to open pictures in some mails, but mostly it does not work, you
can only save them. (attached documents, presentations .... - it is inpossible
to open them, pictures - some times it is possible, it does not depend of what
type ot picture they are, sometimes it works but mostly it doesn't)

Mozilla has also the possibility to display attached files (pictures) in the
mail's textarea, but this mostly does not work now. This is true by mails where
the pictures can not be opened.

This problem does not depend on type of Senders mailclient, because it is not
possible to open attachments also by mails sent from Mozilla.
For me now it is the only possibility how to resolve it - to move back to 1.4.

:-(

??Maybe there are problems by installing new versions into the same folder???

It is possible to fix this into the 1.5 final?

Comment 7

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

(In reply to comment #5)
> I did some more testing and it comes down to this:
> The behaviour I described in Comment #3 only happens with attachments that
> have "Content Type: application/octet-stream" instead of a proper Content Type
> Definition. I'm not sure if this can be fixed on the mozilla side or if it is
> a bug in some mail clients (probably outlook [express]).

The best you can do for this case is to configure Mozilla to handle files of 
type  application/octet-stream   as "Save to Disk" with no default extension.  
See bug 67940.


Seth Klein, is that issue applicable to your original report?

Comment 8

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

No response from reporter; =>WFM