Google Apps as Default Email Client in Ubuntu

I have a vanilla install of Ubuntu Hardy Heron. In Firefox, when I click someone’s email that uses the mailto link, it opens up the Evolution email client. This is the suck if you don’t use a desktop email client which more and more smart people are doing these days.

I use an email with my own domain, hosted on Google Apps for all my email needs. With a little inspiration from this page, I got Google Apps to be the default email client instead. Here’s how…

- Fire up your favorite text editor
- Copy and paste the following code:

#!/bin/sh

firefox "https://mail.google.com/a/yourdomain.org/mail?view=cm&tf=0&to=`echo $1 | sed 's/mailto://'`"

Replace “yourdomain.org” with your hosted Google Apps domain

- Save the file with the “.sh” extension (example: “google_apps_mailto.sh”)
- Use a terminal to make the file executable with the following command:

$ chmod u+x path_to_file


The path_to_file is the location of the script. (example: “~/google_apps_mailto.sh”)

- In Firefox, go to Edit > Preferences > Applications > mailto > Use other…
- Browse to and select the file you just created earlier

Woohoo! Now when you click a mailto link, it should compose a new email in the browser using Google Apps. Test it out by emailing me if it worked info@ozz314.org.

Update:
Thanks to this comment, there’s a more elegant way to do this.

1. In Firefox’s address bar, copy and paste the following and hit enter:
   about:config
2. Click “I’ll be careful, I promise!” when the warning appears
3. In the “Filter:” field, copy and paste:
   gecko.handlerService.allowRegisterFromDifferentHost
4. Double click the found result to change the boolean value from false to true
5. In the address bar, copy and paste the following:
   javascript:window.navigator.registerProtocolHandler("mailto","http://mail.google.com/a/yourdomain.org/mail/?extsrc=mailto&url=%s","Google Apps")
6. Replace “yourdomain.org” with your own Google Apps hosted domain and hit enter
7. Click “Add Application” when it asks you a question
8. go to Edit > Preferences > Applications > mailto
9. Choose “Use Google Apps”

That’s it! Test it out by clicking my email, info@ozz314.org.

I wish Firefox had it as a default option instead of the craptastic Yahoo! Mail.