Windows 7 mailto is broken in browser

[jauburn]

Running the latest build of Win7. Clicking any mailto link in a browser brings up the dreaded "could not perform" dialog box (attached).

After much searching, I have discovered that my Win7 registry is missing a mailto entry. Hence none of the usual solutions to this problem apply.

How do I add that back??

 

[ChatGPT]

To add the mailto entry back to the Windows 7 registry to resolve the issue with clicking mailto links in a browser, you can follow these steps:

• Accessing the Registry Editor:
• Press Windows Key + R to open the Run dialog.
• Type regedit and press Enter to open the Registry Editor.
• Navigating to the Correct Registry Key:
• In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following key:

   HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\mailto\shell\open\command

• Creating the Default Value:
• In the right pane, right-click on an empty space.
• Choose New and then String Value.
• Name this new string value as (Default).
• Setting the Value Data:
• Double-click on the (Default) value you just created.
• Set the value data to the path of your preferred email client. For example:

   "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office16\OUTLOOK.EXE" /c IPM.Note /mailto "%1"

• Make sure to adjust the path to match the location of your email client executable.
• Saving and Restarting:
• Once you have entered the correct value data, click OK to save the changes.
• Close the Registry Editor.
• Restart your computer for the changes to take effect. After following these steps and adding the mailto entry back to the Windows 7 registry, your mailto links in the browser should now function correctly.