244196 - mozilla.exe -mail mailto_URL does not open a compose window

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 220306

(MailNews Core :: Composition, defect)

Description

[George Glynn]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7) Gecko/20040514
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7) Gecko/20040514

According to the documentation at:

   http://www.mozilla.org/docs/command-line-args.html

the command line "mozilla.exe -mail mailto_URL" should open a new compose window
to the e-mail adddress referenced in the mailto URL. However, it just opens a
new main MailNews window, same as it does if no mailto_URL parameter is supplied
at all; that is, no compose window opens at all. If I drop the -mail switch, a
compose window with the correct "To:" address opens, but a blank browser window
with the mailto URL in the address line opens behind it. Using the -compose
switch opens a compose window and nothing else, but the e-mail address in the
mailto URL is not filled in on the "To:" line, because of the syntax rules for
the -compose switch arguments.

This breaks the common URL:MailTo Protocol Handler solution, which uses the
mozilla.exe -mail "%1" command-line for the "open" action, where %1 is a mailto
URL passed by the OS when a mailto: hyperlink is clicked in a non-Mozilla browser.


Reproducible: Always
Steps to Reproduce:

Comment 1

[Stephen Donner [:stephend] Not actively reading bugmail]

Dup of bug 236774, I think.

Comment 2

[George Glynn]

It's exactly a dup. The main concern here is the fact that "-mail mailto_URL"
used to do something and is documented to do it and no longer does.

Comment 3

[George Glynn]

Er, that should read, "It's _not_ exactly a dup." Sorry for the typo.

Comment 4

[Stephen Donner [:stephend] Not actively reading bugmail]

Well, it's a tad confusing, because bug 236774 states:

'You should be able to invoke the suite with -compose followed by a mailto url. 

The fix for this comes in two parts:

1) nsAppShellService::LaunchTask needs to be modified. Currently, if you pass in
a command line app option like -compose or -mail it ignores any url argument you
may pass and always uses the default args for that command line handler. We need
to open this up and see if there is an argument after the command line handler
arg, if so, use it...'

However, I don't actually see that working.  I see the same bug you do.

I passed in mozilla -mail mailto:[e-mail]?subject=hi

and got only a MailNews window, without any compose window.

So, confirming this bug with build 2004-05-20-09 on Windows XP.

Comment 5

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

The -mail switch does not work, and hasn't since 1.5.  

The workaround (for 1.5 thru 1.7) is to use the  -browser  switch instead.
This usage will result in the symptom seen in bug 204752, but otherwise is 
useful.

Part of the posted patch in bug 236774 is already checked in on the trunk 
(should be in 1.8a); that will allow  -compose  to accept the URL.  This should 
be considered the canonical way to set up the command line (it's what 
Thunderbird uses).  However, as I've noted in that bug, this only works for the 
simple, mail-address-only form of mailto:.

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 220306 ***