222020 - Ctrl-N should open a new window in the default browser

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Thunderbird :: Mail Window Front End, enhancement)

Description

[Ray Trent]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.6a) Gecko/20031002 Firebird/0.7+
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.6a) Gecko/20031002 Firebird/0.7+

One of the really nice things about having mail and browsing combined is that
you frequently want to send email while browsing, and also frequently want to
browse in response to something you read in email. 

I'd like to see Ctrl-N open a Firebird window. I've entered a reciprocal RFE on
Firebird (bug 222019).

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:

Comment 1

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

The whole purpose of the standalone applications is, that we really don't care
which browsing application a user uses. We send out URLs to the standard browser
but not specifically to Firebird. But how should we know which browser the user
uses and how to open a new window there? And all of this in cross-platform way?

I strongly recommend WONTFIX.

Comment 2

[Ray Trent]

Re: comment 1: I would imagine that all OS's would provide some mechanism for
opening a URL in the default browser... in fact, Thunderbird already supports
doing this for links in mails. 

Opening an empty page via a link with attribute 'target="_blank"' would happily
open a new window (with an href to a blank HTML file somewhere in the distro if
that's even necessary). 

It's not at all hard to do this, and it's extremely useful, hence the request. 

I've temporarily worked around this for myself by using the "external
application" extension and assigning a hotkey of Alt-N to launch Firebird, but
that's a hack of the flavor described in comment 2, not a solution. 

Comment 3

[Steve VanSlyck]

No reason why this cannot be OS independent. Firebird allows one to compose
mail, Thunderbird should allow one to bring up a browser window via hotkey,
without having to mouse over to the Throbber.

Comment 4

[Dave Steckel]

Firefox and Thunderbird aren't well integrated like Mozilla with Mozilla mail.
E.g. can't get browser from email, can't email browser pager to anyone.

This is essential to migrate anyone away from Mozilla. I'm about to give up and
go back to 1.7.3 Mozilla where I can get work done rather than copy and pasting
between the two!! 

Comment 5

[Michael Baffoni]

Actually, Firefox does allow you to compose a message with Cntl-m, so now we
just need to fix it in the other direction - cntl-n should open a window in the
default browser (in my case firefox, but not necessarily for everyone).  RE
comment #4, don't forget you can also do a file/send link, although I for one
really miss file/send page (particularly for pages that require signing in, or
have session-based dependencies).

Comment 6

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

An interesting point is that in 1.5 years, this bug has no dups, a handfull of
CCs and essentially no votes. That might be some indication as to how this bug
should be resolved.

OTOH, the longer ctrl-N exists in its present form, having sprung from
implentation of Bug 218328, the less likely TPTB and others will be willing to
take on this bug. 

Scott, et al, seems to me one of two things should happen 
* reverse Bug 218328, so that this bug can eventually be fixed
* mark this bug WONTFIX to squash false hopes

Comment 7

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

*** Bug 302082 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 8

[philiptdotcom]

I very much hope this issue will be fixed!  Again, we're just going back to the
functionality of good ol' Netscape 4.76 (and probably prior)...  Why should we
lose useful features when we "upgrade"?

I think part of the problem is the wording of the original request; it doesn't
necessarily have to be ctrl+n, and it should open the default browser instead of
Firefox (although an "open Firefox" option could be added ADDITIONALLY, but not
instead of, "open default browser").

Ditto comments #2 and #3 and #5 - it's EXTREMELY useful.  I can't believe that
more people aren't knocking down the door for this one.

Per original comment, I "frequently want to browse in response to something [I]
read in email."  This occurs over a dozen times a day and is VERY frustrating.

RE: comment #1, there's obviously a way to "open the default browser" on a
system; it just needs to be implemented here.

Thanks for the idea about the external application + hotkey idea; I'll try it
(although I'd looked for this previously because of this problem to no avail;
I'll look again).

Please DON'T mark as WONTFIX!

Comment 9

[deadpoint]

what is the status on this bug? given there's been no activity on it since last year i'm assuming it's been forgotten about. i'm looking to migrate my company from mozilla 1.7.13 to firefox/thunderbird but this is the last show stopper i'm waiting to be resolved.

Comment 10

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

cc: Bryan for thoughts.  

Comment 12

[Bryan Clark (DevTools PM) [:clarkbw]]

Sorry, I can't see adding this.  Key combos are in short supply and a large number of Thunderbird users have IE as their default browser.  We could just be opening the default browser up, but that doesn't seem within our scope.  We're not going to offer to open up other applications from Thunderbird.

It's better to offer integration points to opening up the browser. (links to click, highlight terms and right click to choose "search for...")  If there are specific areas that trigger the "browse in response to a message" then we can create extensions or file bugs to work on those specific areas.

Seamonkey could be another alternative to the browser / mail client integration that's desired from this bug.