Closed Bug 265769 Opened 20 years ago Closed 16 years ago

incorrect behavior opening/saving certain attachments [.doc .mov etc]. don't open in helper application

Categories

(Thunderbird :: General, defect)

Product:
Thunderbird
Component:
General
Platform:
PowerPC
macOS
Type:
defect
Priority:
Not set
Severity:
normal

Tracking

(Not tracked)

Status:
RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

People

(Reporter: stefpix, Assigned: mscott)

Details

(Whiteboard: closeme 2008-08-28)

Attachments

(2 files)

file in ~/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles/Default.98j/
10.41 KB, text/rdf
Details
~/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles/Default.98j/US/
2.56 KB, text/rdf
Details 
User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/125.5 (KHTML, like Gecko) Safari/125.9
Build Identifier: version 0.8 (20041022)

incorrect behavior handling certain attachments [.doc .mov etc]. don't open in helper application even if 
it is set in the preferences.

with OS X there are drawbacks and unproper behaviour with certain attachments: 

 .doc and .mov files get resaved on the desktop when I double click them instead of being opened 
directly by the default application. I tried to set this in the preferences but it does not work.

 TB behaves correctly instead with .avi files instead: if I double click the attachment icon they open 
directly  in quicktime player without being resaved on the desktop.

but oddly I can't get quicktime to open .mov files directly. 

 then when I save old messages as a eml/html/txt file TB does not save the attachment directly - I need 
to do it separately. 

 if I have a html message with embedded images I can't save the image files separately [save 
attachments is grayed out]. 
.pdf files are not showed in the message body either.

 all this is frustrating as Mail.app I have none o such problems -

I like TB but I'd rather have a better email features rather than RSS/NNTP newsreaders after all.

Reproducible: Always
Steps to Reproduce:
1.send yourself a .mov file
2.double click the attachment icon
3.it will be saved first on the desktop [or whatever default attachments forlder] then it will open in 
quicktime player

with .avi files this does not happen. I guess it has to do with quicktime files handling
I can confirm this sort of problem on Linux.  I created a file "test.doc" in
OpenOffice, saved it then sent it to myself as an attachment.  Thunderbird (0.9)
creates the attachment as type octet/stream.  Upon receipt, I cannot open the
attachment in Thunderbird (either from the Inbox or the Sent mail box).  I only
get a prompt to save the attachment.

If I CC the same messge and attachment to an Outlook mailbox, Outlook identifies
it correctly as an MS-word file and launches Word when it is double-clicked. It
looks like Outlook examines attachments more thoroughly than Thunderbird does.
(In reply to comment #0)
> .doc and .mov files get resaved on the desktop when I double click them
> instead of being opened directly by the default application.
> I tried to set this in the preferences but it does not work.
> TB behaves correctly instead with .avi files instead: if I double click the
> attachment icon they open directly in quicktime player [...]

Stefano: Please be specific on what settings you've made for the .mov and .doc 
entries.  How do the settings compare with the .avi entry?



> when I save old messages as a eml/html/txt file TB does not save the
> attachment directly - I need to do it separately. 

This is expected behavior.


> if I have a html message with embedded images I can't save the image files
> separately [save attachments is grayed out].

Right-click on the images to save them separately.  If they're embedded, they're 
not "attachments".  You can also use
  View | Message Body As | Plain Text
which will show all the embedded images as attachments.

If you save a message as .eml, the images are included in the file, but there is 
a known problem with displaying them correctly on loading the file (into either 
TB or the Mozilla browser) -- see bug 174692.

Save as HTML does not include the images in the saved file, and generates bogus 
<img> tags; this is bug 164154.

If you save as text, images and attachments are simply not included (but any 
'alt' text associated with the <img> tag is substituted for embedded images).


> .pdf files are not showed in the message body either.

No, they're not; and neither are .doc, .rtf or host of other proprietary 
formats.  Again, this is expected.
(In reply to comment #2)
> (In reply to comment #0)
> > .doc and .mov files get resaved on the desktop when I double click them
> > instead of being opened directly by the default application.
> > I tried to set this in the preferences but it does not work.
> > TB behaves correctly instead with .avi files instead: if I double click the
> > attachment icon they open directly in quicktime player [...]
> 
> Stefano: Please be specific on what settings you've made for the .mov and .doc 
> entries.  How do the settings compare with the .avi entry?

Stefano, this query is still open.  Please respond.

See also bug 261766, which I suspect this bug is a duplicate of.
well if i double click a .mov attachment instead of opening directly in a new
quicktime player window it gets saved on the desktop.

other types of video [ .avi ] files get opened correctly and directlyin qt
player. not .mov files.

same with doc files. must be a problem with os x only...
well if i double click a .mov attachment instead of opening directly in a new
quicktime player window it gets saved on the desktop.

other types of video [ .avi ] files get opened correctly and directlyin qt
player. not .mov files.

same with doc files. must be a problem with os x only...
Stefano, please locate the file in your Thunderbird profile called
  mimeTypes.rdf
and attach it to this bug, using the Create New Attachment link above.
second file - inside US folder
Thank you.  The first of those is the important one.

> .doc and .mov files get resaved on the desktop when I double click them
>   instead of being opened directly by the default application. [...]
> 
> TB behaves correctly instead with .avi files instead: if I double click the
>   attachment icon they open directly  in quicktime player without being
>   resaved on the desktop.

That .RDF file has no entry for any MIME types for an AVI file (such as 
video/msvideo or application/x-troff-msvideo).  Presumably TB is getting the  
handler from the system.  When you try to open a .AVI, does it open the file in 
the Quicktime player immediately, or does it give you a dialog to query whether 
to open or save?


> I tried to set [the default behavior for .MOV and .DOC] in the preferences
> but it does not work.

What exactly does "it does not work" mean?  The big problem at bug 261766 is 
that the "Open" button is disabled, so that "Save" is the only selectable 
option; is that what you're seeing in the Attachment options?
I've also had this infuriating behaviour under Mozilla and Thunderbird since
*way* back.

I've always suspected that it's caused by the mail client *composing* the email
attaching the file as application/octet-stream instead of application/msword or
something like that.

Perhaps if Mozilla / Thunderbird encounters an application/octet-stream it could
fall back to inspecting the file extension?

Or maybe we should just fix it so everything doesn't get attached as
application/octet-stream?

Either way, it's incredibly annoying - especially when I get called over by
people all around the office just so I can open an attachment for them.
By the way, this is by no means restricted to Macs. It happens under Linux and
Windows as well.
gif message attachment inappropriately labeled as "application/octet-stream". 
Thunderbird recognizes that it is a gif, but then wants to open it with "gimp",
which is not my choice of application in my preferences (I prefer kuickshow).
The problem is reproducable.

Thunderbird 1.0.6 (downloaded from Mozilla)
Operating system: Linux Mandriva 10.2 runing kernel 2.6.11

Note: when I attempt to open the identical attachment on another computer
running  Linux Fedora Core 3 (and using their own Thunderbird 1.0.6 rpm)
runing kernel 2.6.9, the gif opens using kuickshow, just as I wanted, so I have
no idea where how problem arises.

If it helps, I can send a copy of a message with this problem.

Hope this is not painful to fix.   -- Jerry
QA Contact: general
Reporter, does the issue still occur with the latest supported 2.0.0.x / Shredder trunk nightlies?

(1.5.0.x is now end-of-life and the latest supported Thunderbird version 2 is 2.0.0.16)
Whiteboard: closeme 2008-08-28
RESO INCO per lack of response to the last question. If you feel this change was made in error, please respond to this bug with your reasons why.
Status: UNCONFIRMED → RESOLVED
Closed: 16 years ago
Resolution: --- → INCOMPLETE
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