How to install WebMailCompose in Firefox 2.0

written January 15 2007 by
Joe
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129 Comments so far. Go, post one!
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Update

The plugin now also can be installed for Firefox 3.
If you want to contribute or donate, visit the development site.

In consequence of some obscurities which occurred related to the last article, here’s a little guide on how to install the WebMailCompose Plugin for Firefox 2.0.

1. Make sure you’ve downloaded the plugin from here.

2. Start Firefox 2.0 and open the downloaded file via “File” → “Open File”.
Choose the downloaded file and click on the “Open”-button.

3. Firefox 2.0 now tells you that it has found an unsigned item. Wait a few seconds before the Install button is activated. Then click on “Install now”.

4. The “Add-Ons”-window appears. There’s a button labeled with “Restart Firefox”. Click on it, then Firefox restarts.

5. After Firefox has restarted, the WebMailCompose features are available via the context menu which appears when you click on a mail link. Now we’re going to make it work for left-clicks.

Note: The following example shows how to make it work with GMail.

6. Right-click on any mail link. A context menu appears. Select “WebMailCompose” → “Settings” as seen in the screenshot below.

7. The “Settings”-window appears. Set the settings for the “General”– and the “WebMail Services”-tab as seen in the following screenshots.

Settings for the “General”-tab

Settings for the “WebMail Services”-tab

8. Click the “OK” button. Each time you left-click on an email link, a “GMail-compose-screen” should appear in a new tab.

Hope it works for you. Please let me know if anything’s unclear.

129 Comments

Make our day bright and participate!
Permalink to this comment { David Boyer }
on January 15 2007 (about 21:18 PM)

Thanks for upgrading the extension for FF2. I use it with my Yahoo account without trouble. Very handy.

Any thoughts on how to get this extension work the Bluetie.com service if possible at all?

Permalink to this comment { Dirk }
on January 16 2007 (about 18:07 PM)

Thanks! Works like a charm.

Permalink to this comment { Brf }
on January 17 2007 (about 04:47 AM)

I never thought it would be so tough to try and get outlook to stop popping open every time I clicked on an email link. After many failed hacks in the about:config tab within Firefox I got frustrated and started searching in depth on google and saw this mod’d XPI for the first time. Glad to report it worked flawlessly. I would say it’s not quite the same since it takes a right click menu to initiate the desired action and another (left or right) click over the Webmail of your choice….but I don’t mind that..since this gives the flexibility to do the old standard once left click over the link for outlook mail just as before also. I appreciate the guy who originally wrote the older version, but much thanks to Joe and anyone else who helped on updating the old XPI for compatibility in Firefox 2.0! I hope to see this get more support in the Firefox extension area as newer rev’s of FF are always coming out. I’d donate for this one.

Thanks again,
-Brf

Permalink to this comment { Simon }
on January 20 2007 (about 17:58 PM)

Many thanks for updating this extension

Permalink to this comment { Quentin Ganser }
on January 23 2007 (about 06:01 AM)

Thanks
this program saves sooooo much time

Permalink to this comment { Bruno }
on January 23 2007 (about 23:36 PM)

Many thanks, works perfect for me!

Permalink to this comment { mike }
on January 27 2007 (about 10:31 AM)

8. Click the “OK” button. Each time you left-click on an email link, a “GMail-compose-screen” should appear in a new tab.

sorry man, that doesnt work for me, left clicking still opens up outlook, i have to right click and select compose gmail

any idea how to fix it?

Permalink to this comment { Julio }
on January 29 2007 (about 16:07 PM)

Fantastic! Thanks for this!

One suggestion – when you say to right click on an email link in the instructions, it would be convenient if you provided one there to use. I found one on the Sparkling Studios home page :-) , although you may prefer to use a dummy such as mailto:foo@bar.com

Cheers,<br>
Julio

Permalink to this comment { Andy }
on January 30 2007 (about 00:51 AM)

Excellent; Makes GMail better

Permalink to this comment { snaponit }
on February 06 2007 (about 09:36 AM)

Thanks! IE7 would pop up like 50 windows when I clicked on an email link in Firefox. This saves me. I might actually click email links now for the first time ever.

Permalink to this comment { jenn }
on February 10 2007 (about 18:25 PM)

it works beautifully, linking to my email. Any chance I can figure out to get it to automatically open with the persons email addy in the TO field?

Permalink to this comment { mouse }
on February 12 2007 (about 06:56 AM)

Thanks for updating this extension.

Please consider adding pre-configured functionality for inbox.com in the future.

Permalink to this comment { WeeeBeep }
on February 13 2007 (about 04:41 AM)

Yay, it works. Thanks :)

Permalink to this comment { Shai }
on February 14 2007 (about 00:18 AM)

Great extension. Works perfectly with Yahoo! Mail. Many thanks

Permalink to this comment { Tom Watson }
on February 15 2007 (about 16:43 PM)

I am using Firefox 2. I have tried every method to make GMail open when I want to send a message from an application. But instead, Outlook Express always opens .

GMail is set as my default. I have applied the WebMailCompose extension. I have applied the registry edits. I have made the appropriate settings in the WebmailCompose Options.

I have set Google Talk to use GMail as default.

I have downloaded GMail Notifier, and set it to use GMail as the default.

Outlook Express still opens.

It’s annoying.

Tom

Permalink to this comment { Susan }
on February 23 2007 (about 02:04 AM)

Could someone please tell me what the default URL is for enabling Gmail? I was playing around with it and now it doesn’t work :-(

Thanks,

Susan

Permalink to this comment { Randy }
on February 23 2007 (about 13:56 PM)

This item works to bring up yahoo email, google email with left or right mouse click. However, it does not put the email address in the TO: field. I have to copy the email address in the web page and then insert it in the email TO: field.

Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks,
Randy

Permalink to this comment { Ptath }
on February 27 2007 (about 17:13 PM)

Thanks to Julio for his post regardiing the mailto link. I thought I was a dummy when I couldn’t find the WebMailCompose menu!

Permalink to this comment { Henrique Maia }
on February 28 2007 (about 13:24 PM)

Thanks for posting this helpful information here. It sure helps.

Permalink to this comment { eudaemonia }
on March 03 2007 (about 09:43 AM)

Barking brilliant! I thought I was going mad after upgrading to FF2.O.x when I couldn’t click to compose mail any longer.

Many thanks for the handiest extension of all.

Permalink to this comment { Peppyy }
on March 04 2007 (about 20:08 PM)

Not the same but thanks.
I was using the old version in 1.5.0.10 and had compose and read listed under tools. This was the only thing that was stopping me from upgrading to 2x

Too late now.

Permalink to this comment { Yaverot }
on March 07 2007 (about 19:22 PM)

Does this work with AOL’s webmail?
Any chance this (fixed version) could be put on firefox’s site, so we don’t need to follow a second page google hit to a place that links to these directions?

Permalink to this comment { MNS }
on March 09 2007 (about 01:36 AM)

Thanks for your work in bringing this abandoned extension up to date, but I’m sad to say that left-clicking still opens IE for me, and I have to ‘force quit’ it (in Apple parlance) because it curiously tries to open a gazillion windows, like someone here mentioned, but my rig isn’t powerful enough to pull it off (sidenote: thank Microsoft for NT; in Win9x something like this would’ve brought down the whole system with it). Anyways, any suggestions?

Also, the extension doesn’t pickup e-mails obfuscated with JavaScript, just plain mailto:user@domain.com addresses. Which is absurd considering it should pickup an address from the mailto string.

Thanks again, and let me know if someone figures out a fix.

Permalink to this comment { MNS }
on March 09 2007 (about 05:56 AM)

Well, after a while of fiddling around I realized an extension I already had installed and love to use already had mailto link detection and redirection: Gmail Manager. And it works perfectly! Though it obviously only works for Gmail, but everyone on the Internet uses Gmail already, right?

Though I’m still left out without JavaScript obfuscated redirection, but I suppose I could live without it.

Permalink to this comment { Kevin Sherman }
on March 09 2007 (about 10:24 AM)

There is a god! Thank you for fixing Webmailcompose!

Permalink to this comment { Jim }
on March 10 2007 (about 00:12 AM)

Very nice. Any chance you can get it to use the pre-existing yahoo mail tab and not have it open a second one?

Permalink to this comment { Frank }
on March 12 2007 (about 20:57 PM)

You rock!

webmailcompose was broken, but now works thanks to you.

I appreciate your help.

and if you had a donation page, i would send you a buck. seriously.

Permalink to this comment { Cathy }
on March 13 2007 (about 10:23 AM)

This is magical! Thank you, you have made my day!

Permalink to this comment { dubqnp }
on March 14 2007 (about 12:37 PM)

It almost works for me. I cant for the life of me get left-click to work, but right clicking works – thats good enough for me :)

Permalink to this comment { Jeff W }
on March 14 2007 (about 21:12 PM)

Thanks for updating this. That’s a great help. Wonder why Jed Brown’s site is offline.

Not sure why, but the options dialog for this extension has always been too short vertically so it cuts off some of them. I presume it’s not doing this for everyone. It does it with the default FF themes, not just different ones.

Suggestions for fixing it welcomed.

Permalink to this comment { Meg }
on March 18 2007 (about 06:30 AM)

Well it works fine for mailto links but unfortunately I have this handy bit of code to protect from spammer worms and it doesn’t work for that javascript at all (and webmailcompose has in the past…. now not even with a right click – options just don’t appear.

Any chance for this: http://www.pacificwildlifecare.org/events.html any email link like upper right. You can see the javascript code which concatonates the address. This worked yesterday (3/16/07), but not today. I uploaded your update but still no. I send $ if you fix it.

Permalink to this comment { V }
on April 09 2007 (about 08:20 AM)

I second an earlier comment… I would donate for this. You. Rock. On. Toast.

Permalink to this comment { Patti }
on April 14 2007 (about 03:57 AM)

I cannot even get webcompose to download with firefox 2.0. Says it isn’t compatible for this version. You say to download the plugin from “here”. I clicked on “here” and nothing happened. I found no other link on this page to download.
Any help would be appreciated.

Permalink to this comment { kommen }
on April 14 2007 (about 08:58 AM)

You can right-click on the “here” link and select “Save Link as…” from the popup menu to save the xpi file on your PC.

Permalink to this comment { Patti }
on April 14 2007 (about 20:04 PM)

Okay, I got it installed and it goes to Gmail. What is Gmail? Is there a way to make it go right to my Yahoo Mail? Thanks for the advice though.

Permalink to this comment { kommen }
on April 14 2007 (about 20:09 PM)

Go to Tools → Add-ons and select Webmailcompose.
Click on Preferences.

There you can set the webmailservice which should be used.

Permalink to this comment { Andy }
on April 19 2007 (about 19:50 PM)

Nope. Doesn’t work. Followed your instructions to the letter and it still goes to outlook when I left-click.

Permalink to this comment { I found new javascript so ... }
on April 20 2007 (about 00:49 AM)

In my previous message, I complained that webmailcompose doesn’t do what it used to before the update. This was a specialized javascript snippet I used so my email address wasn’t found on my websites by spammers.

However, I have since found a new and better snippet of javascript that works fine with webmailcompose. So now all is right with the world (ok world peace we work on tomorrow).

Permalink to this comment { lode }
on April 20 2007 (about 14:32 PM)

Thanks for bringing this to firefox2
I was looking to feed “In-Reply-To:” headers into hotmail, so I added this functionality to this for my own use…

Permalink to this comment { alex }
on April 20 2007 (about 16:33 PM)

you’re xpi link appears to have stopped working :(

Permalink to this comment { Louis }
on April 21 2007 (about 02:38 AM)

Works FANTASTICALLY! Simple and SO effective! Thank you SO much for modifying to work with Firefox 2.0.0.3. I’ve been beating my brain against my computer scouring the ’net for answers. I flat out refused to use IE7 just for mailto: links.

Permalink to this comment { Lisa }
on April 25 2007 (about 18:35 PM)

This is amazing. I’m so glad you updated it for Firefox 2.0.0.3! Thank you! Now I am gonna hold off downloading version 3 because I like this extension too much.

Permalink to this comment { Magnus }
on April 27 2007 (about 18:25 PM)

Susan, you asked for a default string for the gmail compose-window right?

i searched a long time for that one as well, and the best that i’ve stumbled upon is :

<a href="https://mail.google.com/a/?view=cm&amp;fs=1&amp;to=^T&amp;su=^S&amp;body=^M&amp;cc=^C&amp;bcc=^B">https://mail.google.com/a/?view=cm&fs=1&to=^T&su=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B</a>

works fine for me! :)

Permalink to this comment { Jeff }
on April 30 2007 (about 23:32 PM)

For AOL I inserted this into the “other” – not sure if it will only work temporarily

<a href="http://webmail.aol.com/25045/aol/en-us/Mail/compose-message.aspx?mailto=^T&amp;mailcc=^C&amp;mailbcc=^B&amp;mailsubject=^S&amp;mailbody=^B">http://webmail.aol.com/25045/aol/en-us/Mail/compose-message.aspx?mailto=^T&mailcc=^C&mailbcc=^B&mailsubject=^S&mailbody=^B</a>

Feature I am really interested in is to right click a pic and be able to automatically attach – guess to complicated… wonder if it works with yahoo or gmail notifier

Permalink to this comment { Jeff }
on April 30 2007 (about 23:33 PM)

Formatting got a little messed up on my AOL url above. Just copy the parameters from Netscape using url above.

Permalink to this comment { kommen }
on May 01 2007 (about 09:19 AM)

Jeff, thanks for the link.
I’ve cleared up the formatting in your first post.

Permalink to this comment { daniel }
on May 11 2007 (about 21:47 PM)

looks great and works fine – other than when the mail to has subject/text included, then i get an ascii showing spaces as %20, etc… is there a fix for that?

Permalink to this comment { Isaiah }
on May 14 2007 (about 16:22 PM)

Followed your instructions to the letter also, but left-click still sends me to Outlook. Boo.

Permalink to this comment { Ben }
on May 16 2007 (about 06:47 AM)

works perfectly, thanks for the work!

Permalink to this comment { Heywood Jablome }
on May 22 2007 (about 03:53 AM)

Works flawlessly…Thanks (-:

Permalink to this comment { Durango }
on May 27 2007 (about 03:39 AM)

After carefully following instructions I’m not having much success! Created a toolbar link to Windows Live Mail which works fine but when I right click I see no reference to “WebMailCompose” I can reach the options via Tools, Options and have enabled Hotmail.com. Please Help!

Thanks.
.

Permalink to this comment { mlb3820 }
on May 30 2007 (about 19:02 PM)

Worked like a charm, thank you. FF2 on Ubuntu Feisty Fawn.

Permalink to this comment { kdghty }
on June 05 2007 (about 20:32 PM)

i would still like to have the standard send link function and to be able to choose my regular email account. apparently i’m a bit too dense to figure out how to do this! tx.

Permalink to this comment { larry }
on June 06 2007 (about 06:53 AM)

wonderful hack of an old extension…..works perfectly!!!!
thank you

Permalink to this comment { rattler }
on June 10 2007 (about 06:53 AM)

It works but when I click a mailto, it loads a new gmail page in compose mode, which kills my chat if I have gmail already loaded in another tab or window.

How can I use this add-on without killing my chat?

I have FF 2.0.0.4.

tia,

r.

Permalink to this comment { jed }
on June 17 2007 (about 17:55 PM)

The link is no longer working: getting a 404 not found message.

Permalink to this comment { nnnaa }
on June 19 2007 (about 03:58 AM)

I would like to install or add comcast toolbar 2.2
My efforts have failed.

Permalink to this comment { Bill }
on June 19 2007 (about 16:37 PM)

The above link gives a 404 not found message but when I right click → “save link as” it down loads an xpi file. However when I try to open it Firefox will not install it because it says that it is “not a valid install package”.

Any help?

Permalink to this comment { kommen }
on June 25 2007 (about 20:12 PM)

hi,

the link above was broke a while, but should work now.

regards
kommen

Permalink to this comment { Blake Thornton }
on June 27 2007 (about 23:27 PM)

Thanks, this is what I was looking for.

Permalink to this comment { John Gossom }
on June 28 2007 (about 21:13 PM)

I am extremely pleased to have found what you accomplished here. It is amazing how little things like not being able to click on a link and go right to your email become so frustrating. Great job and thanks again for making it available. Long live open source altruism!

Permalink to this comment { Kevin }
on July 24 2007 (about 03:12 AM)

Thank you!

Permalink to this comment { Saurabh }
on July 29 2007 (about 23:52 PM)

Amazing… you change 1.4 to 2.* and get 62 thank yous! Where do I sign up for your charm school?

Permalink to this comment { Dianne }
on August 01 2007 (about 17:57 PM)

Wonderful! Works with Firefox 2 in both XP and Mac OSX. You rock!

Permalink to this comment { Adam }
on August 02 2007 (about 13:41 PM)

For months I’ve been missing this functionality. Thanks for making the fix!

Permalink to this comment { david }
on August 19 2007 (about 23:01 PM)

wow, that’s great.

TYhanks

Permalink to this comment { Shiaoran }
on September 15 2007 (about 08:32 AM)

In the preferences, when I click the OK button, it does nothing. :P
I need to click Cancel to exit, so it doesn’t make any changes.
Also, do you know how to have the mail toolbar button back on Fx2?

Permalink to this comment { dpharr7 }
on September 28 2007 (about 03:30 AM)

Wonderful work and relatively easy to do. Why in the world did they remove this functionality from Firefox? To push Thunderbird? This is a PC so I need fewer programs, not more. Thanks guys!

Permalink to this comment { GREG COCHRAN }
on October 16 2007 (about 11:08 AM)

Wow!…
Works Great!!!
I am almost a computer virgin… and you made this easy!…
Thank you!…
Greg Cochran
Moses Lake WA
USA

Permalink to this comment { Lex }
on November 05 2007 (about 14:28 PM)

Thanks very much for updating this extension, and posting this article.
Please add the terms
mailto mailto: webmail compose extension
to your main article text, so it ranks higher in Google searches!

Permalink to this comment { gdx }
on November 22 2007 (about 17:46 PM)

Seems to be working for me fully only with Gmail (with Gmail and Yahoo tested). Yahoo only works when I’m already logged in. When I’m not, right or left click will bring up the Yahoo login window, after login I’m inside my personal Yahoo account, but I don’t have an email form ready and waiting to be filled in. Clicking on ‘compose new mail’ brings up a blank email form with no fields filled, somehow the info seems to get lost on some point. Maybe another Yahoo thing there… :(

Permalink to this comment { david }
on January 09 2008 (about 05:06 AM)

hotmail changed the url, bah – wmc works great, hotmail is getting to be really aaaaarghh

Permalink to this comment { Mike }
on January 13 2008 (about 04:59 AM)

My Webmail Compose stopped working all of a sudden. It start to launch the GMail page but it never comes up. Anyone else having trouble?

Let me know if anyone has a fix…

Permalink to this comment { ultra }
on January 13 2008 (about 20:44 PM)

Same here. My webmail compose add extension has not been able to function with my e-mail account. It states GMAIL as “loading,” but nothing ever results.

Permalink to this comment { Pam }
on January 14 2008 (about 22:28 PM)

Does it work with AOL??

Permalink to this comment { Steve }
on January 17 2008 (about 15:33 PM)

Were any other changes made to the XPI besides changing the version number? If not, I’ll just make that change myself (I tend to be careful about downloading any software from the internet).

Permalink to this comment { Blake Thornton }
on January 25 2008 (about 02:40 AM)

In order to fix webmail compose for the new gmail UI change the line for gmail as follows:

https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&fs=0&ui=1&to=^T&su=^S

Permalink to this comment { ULTRA }
on January 27 2008 (about 01:06 AM)

Blake, I need to thank you tons for that simple fix. I was going crazy not being able to use this small, but important and useful extension. Your help is greatly appreciated.

Permalink to this comment { ULTRA }
on January 27 2008 (about 01:51 AM)

Ok, upon further review…the page loads and that’s great, but the “To:” section doesn’t display the e-mail address where the e-mail is supposed to be sent, but rather the letter “T.” Also, the subject line has just the letter “S” showing. Is there any way to display the e-mail address where the e-mail is going and/or the respective heading in the subject line? Thanks.

Permalink to this comment { ULTRA }
on January 27 2008 (about 02:54 AM)

ok, after messing around with the settings using Blake’s (above) suggestion as a template, i’ve found a way to include both the e-mail address and the subject into the e-mail one’s trying to send out.

copy and paste this into the g-mail webmail services tab in the settings section for webmail compose:

https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&fs=0&ui=1&to=^T&su=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B

you should be good to go.

Permalink to this comment { Leon }
on January 27 2008 (about 19:43 PM)

hi ultra. thanks for trying to get the extensio working again, but was i just being a noob when i tried the copy/paste you suggested? it didn’t work on for gmail left-clicking needs.

Permalink to this comment { kelley }
on January 28 2008 (about 04:20 AM)

I am having the same gmail issue…and unfortunately that last url didn’t work…all it did was add an “M” to the message section. Still just getting “T” and “S”….any other ideas? Thanks for working on this.

Permalink to this comment { johnnyzero }
on January 28 2008 (about 19:03 PM)

The Yahoo Mail “compose” URL stopped working again today. Yahoo must’ve changed something (yest again). Any ideas?

Permalink to this comment { ULTRA }
on January 29 2008 (about 10:39 AM)

i apologize for any confusion earlier folks.

try pasting this code in the gmail webservices tab:

https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&fs=0&ui=1&to=^T&su=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B

just in case, if there’s any semicolon in between the “&” and the “f” above where the hyperlink ends, remove it. for some reason, this blog adds it when it converts part of the hyperlink.

Permalink to this comment { ULTRA }
on January 29 2008 (about 10:54 AM)

certain characters are getting confused/omitted when pasting the code in this blog.

1) remove the semicolon as stated above
2) see second to very last character (the one before the “B” – (ie: ^)? include that character just before the capital T, capital M and capital C (after each equal sign, respectively)

or you can click this link which should lead you to the mozillazine forums where i also posted it (no characters were omitted there). my post is second to last at the bottom of the page.

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=103810&postdays=0&postorder=asc&postsperpage=15&start=300

Permalink to this comment { madronemedia }
on January 30 2008 (about 20:55 PM)

Ultra—-THANKS for the fix!

Permalink to this comment { New Yahoo Mail vs. Classic }
on February 02 2008 (about 20:47 PM)

This plugin works great when I switch back to Yahoo Mail Class, but not with the newer Yahoo Mail interface. Has anyone succeeded in making it work with the new Yahoo Mail?

Permalink to this comment { Simon in Dublin }
on February 11 2008 (about 10:27 AM)

Hi, thanks that works perfectly!

However but it seems to add something else that I don’t want – that is when in Firefox I go File → send link, it now opens Gmail instead of Outlook, even though Outlook is still my default mail client (per ‘Internet options in XP control panel). Y’see, I use both on this PC – Outlook for work & Gmail for play.

Maybe I can tweak a setting? If I could solve this, the app would be awesome.

Permalink to this comment { Jason! }
on February 12 2008 (about 23:20 PM)

This seems to have stopped working. At least, I can’t get it to work. I get a “Loading…” message on the new tab, and nothing else. I’ve waited quite a while, but nothing else happens.

Did G-mail perhaps change it’s api?

Permalink to this comment { Jason! }
on February 12 2008 (about 23:22 PM)

Doh! Sorry, missed the most recent notes. Never mind.

Permalink to this comment { Denni }
on March 06 2008 (about 18:26 PM)

Thanks for this! It’s working great, although I didn’t get the subject line tweak to work, even with Ultra’s alterations.

The plugin installs automatically, no need to open the file first. (Somebody may have commented on this above but I didn’t see that, perhaps you could edit the original instructions?)

The webmail composer is a godsent and should make it back onto the official extentions list, perhaps with a bit more modification, e.g. the option to send via mail client as Simon in Dublin suggested. —Can’t help there, I’m afraid as I know nothing about coding. I’m just a happy user :)

Permalink to this comment { Zia }
on March 07 2008 (about 11:54 AM)

Fantastic!! Many thanks…I posted a review on my blog

http://zia.blogspot.com

Permalink to this comment { cvc }
on March 08 2008 (about 16:35 PM)

didn’t install ………..message about no secure updates………using ff3beta3…..might be problem,huh?

Permalink to this comment { sean }
on March 27 2008 (about 04:51 AM)

it is a great service, when I use hotmail.com for the mailto: it opens a new tab, but does not open compose email with the mailto: in the TO:

please indicate if there is a fix or I am doing something wrong

Permalink to this comment { sean }
on March 27 2008 (about 04:51 AM)

it is a great service, when I use hotmail.com for the mailto: it opens a new tab, but does not open compose email with the mailto: in the TO:

please indicate if there is a fix or I am doing something wrong

Permalink to this comment { lamar }
on March 29 2008 (about 12:41 PM)

What a simple (from my end) solution to a problem that I have been trying to solve for a long time.

…works like a charm.

Permalink to this comment { lamar }
on March 29 2008 (about 12:42 PM)

What a simple (from my end) solution to a problem that I have been trying to solve for a long time.

…works like a charm.

Permalink to this comment { Andreas }
on April 10 2008 (about 13:16 PM)

I agree with sean. Hotmail doesnt work anymore. It just displays Hotmail startpage. Not the composepage. If someone knows a workaround or fix. Please post.

Permalink to this comment { Andreas }
on April 10 2008 (about 13:16 PM)

I agree with sean. Hotmail doesnt work anymore. It just displays Hotmail startpage. Not the composepage. If someone knows a workaround or fix. Please post.

Permalink to this comment { Joe }
on April 17 2008 (about 05:41 AM)

Sigh…Why doesn’t someone create a new extension for this?

Permalink to this comment { Martin }
on April 28 2008 (about 23:28 PM)

Sorry to be redundant, but I’m also looking for a fix for Hotmail Live. I’ve tried a million versions of the address for Hotmail on the WebMail Services tab of the WebMail Settings, but all bring me to the same place. My inbox, not a Compose screen. Would love an update!

Permalink to this comment { larry }
on May 13 2008 (about 15:24 PM)

any timeframe on getting it to work with ff3?

Permalink to this comment { Kommen }
on May 14 2008 (about 00:53 AM)

Update
I’ve updated the extension to work with Firefox3.
You can download it here:
http://soakedandsoaped.com/files/webmailcompose-0.6.7.xpi

I also set up a git repository so other developers can contribute and make the extension better. You can also donate to the project on this site:
http://github.com/kommen/webmailcompose/

Permalink to this comment { Bruce }
on May 16 2008 (about 22:51 PM)

I got it installed and I ‘m having the same with hotmail. If anyone has a URL that works properly please post it.
At least I’m not having 53 copies of IE opening now every time I click a mail link ;-)

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on May 26 2008 (about 21:58 PM)

Thanks for taking over the reins of WebmailCompose, kommen. It’s a great extension, and deserves to not fall by the wayside.

One question for you & any other users: I can’t seem to figure out the proper URL & strings to use with the UPDATED version of Yahoo Mail Classic.

The URL that works for composing is: http://us.mc302.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?
but I can’t seem to be able to pass the necessary parameters to Yahoo Mail (to, subject, cc:, bcc:, etc).

Just so you’re aware, this is actually a known issue with the updated Yahoo Mail Classic servers. More specifically, it’s a problem with Yahoo’s own ymmapi.dll & .exe – they need to update the darn things to work correctly with their new servers. However, I was hoping WebmailCompose would allow me sidestep this problem.

Any help will be much appreciated.

JohnB

Permalink to this comment { Dave }
on May 27 2008 (about 19:06 PM)

Hey I always liked how with WebmailCompose – after I clicked Send it would return me to my Inbox! This string appears to do the trick.

https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&fs=0&ui=1&to=^T&su=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B

Thanks,
Dave

Permalink to this comment { Dave }
on May 27 2008 (about 19:08 PM)

Sorry – there was an extra ; in there, although it still appears to work. This is the correct string:
https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&fs=0&ui=1&to=^T&su=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B

Permalink to this comment { Steve }
on June 15 2008 (about 19:33 PM)

Hmm… put in Dave’s URL for GMail. Initially it showed up with T, S, and M in the To, Subject, and CC fields. I added ^‘s but doesn’t seem to fix it.

Anyone know a valid GMail link. This is on OSX if that makes a difference.

Permalink to this comment { Dave }
on June 20 2008 (about 22:07 PM)

I’ll try this using some html… hope it works.
<pre>https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&fs=0&ui=1&to=^T&su=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B</pre>

Permalink to this comment { Dave }
on June 20 2008 (about 22:09 PM)

That looks right – except something is adding a semicolon, its not me. So take that semicolon out.

Incidentally (at least for me) this all stopped working after I installed Firefox 3. I’m going to try reinstalling the extension, we’ll see what happens.

Permalink to this comment { Joe R. }
on June 21 2008 (about 09:17 AM)

Thanks for breathing new life back into this extension! I’ve installed it on Firefox 3 (running on Slackware Linux) and everything seems to work fine except the “Send Link…” option in the context menu. My wife is running Kubuntu and is having the same issue, so I don’t think it’s just a bug in my setup. Any idea what the issue is or where I could begin digging around to fix it? Thanks!

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on July 01 2008 (about 22:42 PM)

Since my previous post on this topic, I was FINALLY able to configure Webmail Compose to overcome the MailTo-related problems with the “new” Yahoo Mail Classic.

After much trial & error, I figured out that for some reason the variable names (To, Subject, Cc, etc) need to be NOT capitalized. Like this:

<pre> http://us.mc302.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=^T&subject=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B </pre>

Not like this:

<pre> http://us.mc302.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?To=^T&Subject=^S&Body=^M&Cc=^C&Bcc=^B </pre>

Once I un-capitalized the variable names, it worked like a charm.

(My account uses the us.mc302 server; your server address may be different).

One other hint for Yahoo Mail users: set your Default Read Mail URL to this:

http://us.mc302.mail.yahoo.com/mc/showFolder?fid=Inbox

This will take you directly to your Inbox instead of the Yahoo Mail’s dumb “welcome” screen.

I hope this info is helpful to other Yahoo Mail users.

JohnB

Permalink to this comment { kommen }
on July 01 2008 (about 22:51 PM)

Thanks for your comment John, I just edited the formatting a bit so that the links are displayed in a better way.

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on July 01 2008 (about 23:12 PM)

Thanks, Kommen – that makes the URL’s a lot easier to read.

btw, I found a great page that contains several different MailTo test links. Very useful for testing your Webmail Compose configuration:

http://www.scottseverance.us/mailto.html

JohnB

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on July 02 2008 (about 19:55 PM)

Since my last post, I realized that FF3’s Send Link function is no longer working. If I disable Webmail Compose, it works fine. So I have to conclude that Webmail Compose breaks the Send Link function in FF3.

I assume this is possibly due to the new way that FF3 implements MailTo protocol handlers.

Are any other users experiencing this problem? If so, hopefully Kommen & Co can fix this in a future version.

JohnB

Permalink to this comment { Joe R. }
on July 25 2008 (about 08:01 AM)

JohnB,

I noticed the same thing back in June (look a few posts above your last one). I thought it might be Linux specific because my wife and I both use it, but I tested it at work on my Windows machine there and found the same problem. I have noticed that the “Send Link” function works if you right-click a link to send, but not if you just right-click on a page. I’d be happy to try to fix this if I had any idea where to begin, but I’ve never worked with Firefox plugins before and I don’t know what the Firefox developers changed in Firefox 3. Can anyone point me towards a good resource to begin researching this?

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on July 31 2008 (about 14:49 PM)

Joe R,
I was beginning to think I was the only one who noticed this problem. You’re right – you can send a link, but not the page URL.

Anyway, as a workaround I came across an extension called “Email This!”:

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3102

Unfortunately, it currently only supports Gmail & Yahoo; and local email clients (OE, T’Bird, etc.) under Windows ONLY.

I hope this is helpful.

JohnB

Permalink to this comment { Joe R. }
on August 03 2008 (about 22:28 PM)

JohnB,
Thanks for the suggestion of Email This!… it will definitely suffice as a workaround until either I can figure out how to get everything working or Kommen & Co release a new version that fixes this issue. Appreciate your help!

Permalink to this comment { Fnordmorph }
on August 27 2008 (about 07:05 AM)

I, too, am dismayed the send File/Send Link no longer works with webmailcompose in FF3 (winblows vista). Is this likely to be fixed, or do I get to go back to FF2? (yes, it is that big a deal to me…)

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on September 01 2008 (about 16:27 PM)

FNORDMORPH: did you try the “Email This!” workaround mentioned above? This extension will give you the Send Link functionality back again.

Hope this helps,
JohnB

Permalink to this comment { Fnordmorph }
on September 02 2008 (about 07:21 AM)

Email This doesn’t work with Squirrelmail :(

Permalink to this comment { Trish Firefox User }
on November 14 2008 (about 23:23 PM)

Thank you! You’ve saved my marriage.

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on December 01 2008 (about 20:49 PM)

My Yahoo Mail (classic) mailto links stopped working again recently with WebmailCompose. After much trial & error, I had to change my URL to this:

http://us.f302.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?to=^T&subject=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B

I hope this is helpful to others.

JohnB

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on December 02 2008 (about 16:49 PM)

Insert your thoughts here..

Permalink to this comment { JohnB }
on December 02 2008 (about 16:49 PM)

Kommen: you may wanna clean up the formatting in my post above.

JohnB

Permalink to this comment { Brian P }
on February 23 2009 (about 15:55 PM)

Thank you so much for the fix for WebMail Compose! It is one of my most favorite add-ons. I was a little concerned it wouldn’t work for Firefox/3.0.6, but happily, it does.

Maybe you could pick up the ball where Jeb Brown left off? I’d be willing to bet he would not mind that, so long as you added included his name as author, here:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/?application=firefox

Permalink to this comment { Michael Rork }
on March 04 2009 (about 09:24 AM)

JohnB was on the right track when he changed his formatting to re-fix the Yahoo Mail issue. I have a better fix if you want the mailto to go to the Classic Compose screen.

Simply add “&ymv=0” to the end, so it will look like this:
<pre> http://us.mc314.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=^T&subject=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B&ymv=0 </pre>

This works for me, and I love that it goes to the classic screen. Quicker loading, and it doesn’t open my YahooMail everytime I click on a mail link. (When emailing ads in Craigslist for apartments it would get really annoying otherwise!)

-Michael

Permalink to this comment { Michael Rork }
on March 04 2009 (about 09:27 AM)

Alright, so my attempt and fixing the formatting to it showed up correctly failed. Sorry.

Same thing, with (carrot) where the carrots should go.

http://us.mc314.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=(carrot)T&subject=(carrot)S&body=(carrot)M&cc=(carrot)C&bcc=(carrot)B&ymv=0

Again though, just add &ymv=0 to the end and it should work.

Permalink to this comment { Rick Fithen }
on July 16 2009 (about 21:05 PM)

Folks the correct syntax for AOL Webmail or AIM Webmail is:..

http://webmail.aol.com/Mail/ComposeMessage.aspx?to=^T&subject=^S&body=^M&cc=^C&bcc=^B

as of 7/16/2009

Cheers!