[xubuntu-users] Strange: thunderbird won't open links ..

[Victor Forberger]

On 1/16/26 11:12, Peter Flynn wrote:
> On 15/01/2026 22:00, Marc Coevoet wrote:
>> Op 15-01-2026 om 22:51 schreef Peter Flynn:
>>> On 15/01/2026 21:43, Marc Coevoet wrote:
>>> What is the filetype of the link (if it's not a web page)? Can you 
>>> post the URL?
>>
>> https
> 
> No, not the method, the file type. I assume you can open other https 
> resources OK, is that right? Or are ALL https pages blocked?
> 
> This is EITHER the last token of the URL (eg .html, .pdf, .jpg, etc) OR 
> the Content-Type header sent by the server in response to your click. 
> You can find the response headers from the command line with (eg) wget 
> by using the -S option.
> 
>>> What "other app"?
>>
>> a button that lets you choose --> click --> nothing happens ...
> 
> No, I meant what is the name of this "other app" and where is this button?
> 
> On 16/01/2026 16:21, Victor Forberger wrote:
>  > I have the same problem on my laptop. No links or file types can be
>  > opened directly from within Thunderbird.
> 
> I remember now what my problem was. It was the xdg-open utility which 
> was wrongly configured for whatever type of file I was trying to open.
> 
> XDG is a PITA, IMNSHO (great for acronyms today 😂
> 
> Once you have the file type, you can see what your system is configured 
> to do with that type of file when Tbird (or anything else) cannot handle 
> it alone, using the xdg-mime query option, eg
> 
> $ xdg-mime query default application/pdf
> xreader.desktop
> $ xdg-mime query default application/xml
> vivaldi-stable.desktop
> 
> My guess is that whatever file type it is that you are clicking on, is 
> something your system is not configured to handle, OR (equally likely) 
> Tbird is ignoring XDG's suggestion for weird reasons of it own.
> 
> I once had Tbird refuse to open a saved email message with the .eml file 
> type, despite the entry for message/rfc822 being in /etc/mime.types. It 
> turned out that the system setup had neglected to put an entry for this 
> in XDG's config (a file called defaults.list somewhere, I forget where).
> 
> Peter
> 

I first tried the xdg-mime types. The laptop had no issues there 
(everything is set correctly). The problem is that Thunderbird cannot 
"see" the xdg-mime types because of some kind of apparmour/snap 
misconfiguration.

-Victor

-- 
--
Victor Forberger
vforberger at fastmail.fm
blog: http://linuxatty.wordpress.com

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: OpenPGP_signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 495 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/xubuntu-users/attachments/20260117/c4476507/attachment.sig>