When I click on a link mailto: Brave propose to open Emacs mail client I do not use

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1

Hello Guys,
**Description of the issue:**I’m using Brave Version 1.78.102 Chromium: 136.0.7103.113 (Build officiel) (64 bits) on Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS version.
When on a Web page there is a link mailto:@.com
Brave ask, with a notification if I want to open Emacs (Mail) instead of the Thunderbird email client I use and which is set as default in Ubuntu applications defaults.
How could I tell Brave to actually use the email client specified in systems’s default ?
Many thanks for your help
Have a nice day.

Steps to Reproduce (add as many as necessary): 1. 2. 3.

Actual Result (gifs and screenshots are welcome!):

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image1920×1080 237 KB

Expected result:

Reproduces how often:

Operating System and Brave Version(See the About Brave page in the main menu):
Brave version : Version 1.78.102 Chromium: 136.0.7103.113 (Build officiel) (64 bits)
Ubuntu : Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS (Noble Numbat)
Additional Information:

2

@GeorgesGiralt

Take a look at the issue and replies at

‘Email Handler Missing - #6 by Mattches’

3

Humm,
I’ve seen this, it was proposed when I redacted my question. But I wonder how it applies to my case. I do not use a Web based email client but, instead Mozilla Thunderbird which is set-up to work with my 7 email addresses I use all the time.
Anyway, thank you for looking into my issue !
Have a nice and bright day !
BTW, I tried to go to https://gmail.com/ and I do not have the little symbol in the address bar. So can’t try the proposed solution.
I wonder if the DEB version of Brave I used to install is the exact same version you talk about ? I’m puzzled…

4

@GeorgesGiralt if you launch Brave and go to brave://settings/handlers, do you see a default email handler set here?

5

No, Mattches. Although the description says so nothing, pertaining to email clients. The only choice I’ve is if I want to allow sites to handle protocols or not (I’ve to translate from French, which is my default language)

6

@GeorgesGiralt interesting – not sure why Brave thinks that emacs is the default handler for your system. Even if you have Thunderbird set as your default, your emacs configuration may be overriding it – can you check and confirm that the mailto protocol in Emacs email is not set to be the default?

I believe you can do this by editing the mail-handler-file (typically located in ~/.emacs or ~/.emacs.el) and modifying the mail-handler-file variable to nil:

 (setq mail-handler-file nil)

You may also potentially need to modify the mail-command option in this way as well:

(setq mail-command nil)

Let me know if one of these solutions (or both together) resolve the issue.

7

What happens if you type xdg-email on the command line? Does it open emacs or does it open a new Thunderbird window?

1 Like
8

Mattches,
I’ve no email client settings in my Emacs because I do not use Emacs. I’m a Vi guy. Emacs is installed because my wife is fan of it.
So no .emacs directory.
And, of course, nothing has changed …
Fmariers,
It works fine see

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IMHO it has something to do with a Brave setting somewhere…
Thank you all for your help !

9

I assume you see Thunderbird if you open gnome-control-center and click on Default Applications?

Screenshot from 2025-05-28 12-00-35
Screenshot from 2025-05-28 12-00-351270×707 57.8 KB

1 Like
10

Two more things to check:

$ grep mailto /etc/mailcap
x-scheme-handler/mailto; firefox %s; test=test -n "$DISPLAY"
x-scheme-handler/mailto; geary %s; test=test -n "$DISPLAY"
x-scheme-handler/mailto; thunderbird %s; test=test -n "$DISPLAY"

$ grep mailto ~/.mailcap
grep: /home/francois/.mailcap: No such file or directory
1 Like
11

Fmarier,
Thank you for your help.
Yes, the gnome-control-center show Thunderbird as my default email client.
But, the mailcap file is another matter entirely.
Here is what I’ve got :
grep mailto /etc/mailcap
x-scheme-handler/mailto; emacs -f message-mailto %s; test=test -n “$DISPLAY”
x-scheme-handler/mailto; sh -c “u=\$(echo \”\$1\" | sed ‘s/[\\\"]/\\\\&/g’); exec /usr/bin/emacsclient --alternate-editor= --reuse-frame --eval \“(message-mailto \\\”\$u\\\“)\”" sh %s; test=test -n “$DISPLAY”
x-scheme-handler/mailto; thunderbird %s; test=test -n “$DISPLAY”
So it seems Emacs takes preference over Thunderbird in mail sending …
Frankly, I never ever touch Mime types by hand so I wonder why this is set like that.
The only reason I could think of is that Thunderbird comes preinstalled in Ubuntu and I had to install Emacs so maybe the order of installation is of some importance.
I have no idea on how I could edit this file in order to have Thunderbird come first in the mailcap file.
Thank you and have a nice day !

12

Hi !
An update…
I thought that even if gnome showed Thunderbird as my default client I could have luck at forcing it.
So I went to gnome-control-panel, selected another mail app to handle emails (in my case the list I had available was “Thunderbird, Emacs (Mail), Emacs (Mail, client), Firefox, and another Thunderbird”.
So I set it to Firefox, quit control panel, go back to it and then select Thunderbird. And it works.

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I’m happy !
A nice day begins !
Edit : Nothing has changed in the /etc/mailcap file. The order stays the same. So Brave does not rely on this file for finding the mail handling capability, IMHO.

13

Ah, the good old “turning if off and on again” technique :slight_smile:
Glad to know it worked for you!