Allow users to add their own rules for default opening methods.

[Hydrogen]

Hi,

In Thunderbird, when I double-click an email attachment, it opens with the default application I've set for that file type. However, I'm unable to add new file types to this list (please see image). For example, I frequently receive .R and .Rmd files from students. Being able to open these with Positron or RStudio via a single double-click would greatly simplify my quick reviews.

In summary, I'd like to enable users to expand this list themselves. 

 

[Jon]

Thanks for submitting an idea to the Mozilla Connect community! Your idea is now open to votes (aka kudos) and comments.

[MattAuSupport1]

You double click the attachment, select the application to use and also select the use this application for this file type in future option.  The list is modified for your choices, but attachments are not defined by a file extension and your suggestion implies this is relevant.  It is not.  Actions are definded by media type.  Basically only Windows uses file extensions to identify media and try as I might, I can not see a media type for positron or Rstudio.  I did look, and invite you to spend some time reviewing this list.  https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml

I have no idea what media type is being used to encode your attachments.  I see lots of use of octet-Binary from Windows trained developers because they do not appear to grasp the concept that media type is important and it usually works to transmit and save the file at the other end.  But as you have observed make for a less than satisfying result when it comes to opening the file.

Having a registered media type is crucial for having files correctly handled on the internet.  Positron claims from it's my Google search which took me to their github repository to be A next-generation data science IDE built by Posit PBC  I wonder why a next generation product with AI assistance designed for computer science education would be lacking a media type that is integral to internet transfer and unix file systems. 

To quote Google's AI. "In Unix and Linux, file extensions are primarily for human readability and convention, and do not inherently determine file type or execution behaviour at the operating system level, unlike in systems such as Windows." I will add that it extends to the internet in general. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Guides/MIME_types

Thunderbird does have an addon that will open attachments by file extension. https://services.addons.thunderbird.net/EN-us/thunderbird/addon/openattachmentbyextension/ but it does not appear to be available for any version but Thunderbird but 128.