Mail will not stay as default email reader

chesters wrote:

I had exactly the same software and problem as LoRob, but my ~/Library/Preferences folder contained NO files with the prefix com.apple.mail. Where is it hidden? How is Microsoft overriding it?

The user Library is hidden, to get to it depress the option key, click on the Go menu, select Libray, release the option key.

I eventually solved the sticky-Outlook-in-Mail problem after seeing a suggestion to clear the hidden ACLs and whatnot with obscure Terminal commands. Instead, I used the freeware Onyx.app's Maintenance menus to accomplish the same clearances. You still need admin power to do this, but it works.

You acan also download the free EasyFind from Devon Technologies - it will find hidden files very easily.

I know how to find hidden files with or without 3rd party apps, thanks

rlrear wrote:

Uninstalling is really not an option. I use Word and Excel to do mail merge for an organization that I am in. Unfortunately, Word will not use Mail as the email client and Pages and Numbers do not have that capability.. I had no problem when I had to use Entourage.

My copy of Word uses Mail as the client (Mail 6.2, Mountain Lion 10.8.2) yours is borked.

Hi I'm new to Mac! I have installed office and use excel and word etc. I would like to be able to share from the menu at the top and it was opening outlook. I can not use outlook as it won't sync with the calendar so useless for me really. I have unistalled outlook (trashed it from the app folder). Now if i try and share the excel document i am in it says its unable and to please make sure my email is configured correctly and that I can send mail!

Sorry to appear such a novice but how to I get it to send from my mail on my Mac?

Any help is much appreciated :-) ( I am not sure how I press Go? Inow know which is the option key

I can confirm that removing the com.apple.mail.plist.lockfile solution did work - after I figured out that "Restart" meant restart the computer and not just Mail!

Thanks

i had the same problem, fixed thanks to this thread. here's how i fixed mine:

1. quit mail

2. dragged ~/Applications (Parallels) to the desktop

3. launched mail

4. launched mail prefs... default reader now shows as Mail.app (6.6)

5. closed prefs

6. re-opened prefs, just to make sure still set correctly

7. quit mail

8. re-launched mail, check prefs... still good

9. quit mail

10. dragged Applications (Parallels) back to ~/

11. re-launch mail, check prefs... still good

and, just to make sure, i:

1. quit mail

2. launched parallels

3. opened 'default apps' control panel (but didn't change anything)

4. quit (suspended) parallels

5. re-launched mail and checked prefs, just to make sure... still good

note: i had no com.apple.plist.lock file. i also tried repairing the disk, new plist, etc.

change the default email client back to Mail (in mail / preferences / general), close the dialog box, quit mail and rebuild your launch services database.

run the following terminal command

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain local -domain system -domain user

see if the default client sticks after that.

A reboot after the rebuild won't hurt either.

@tcab32 - Thank you! rebuilding the launch services db finally fixed this problem for me. And rebooting was mandatory. This had nothing to do with any other app grabbing the default mail reader assignment. (In my case Aquamacs (an Emacs editor fork) was being assigned. There's no way Aquamacs was grabbing the default.)

Confirmed in El Capitan that tcab32's suggestion takes care of it, and that the reboot is required. In my case, I couldn't stop Chrome from being the Default Email Reader no matter what I tried, which was preventing Mail from showing up in the Share Extensions. Thanks for the help!

I use Parallels and I had this problem. It turns out that Parallels has an application "Mail.app" that causes conflicts and stops switching the default to the Mac side. I solved the issue by changing the name of the Parallels side application to "Mail2.app," then going into Mail on the Mac side and changing default mail preferences (Use the Select... option) to Mail.app. The Parallels app is found for me in the library Mac HD/Users/DavidonAir/Applications (Parallels), but you'll have different user and HD names.

I can also confirm that tcab32's solution worked for me on El Capitan with Chrome.

I can also confirm that the setting stuck after following those instructions...but...i'm trying to share documents and have them send through outlook and they still open in Mail.

So the setting may be sticking but it's still not truly changing the default email client or those emails would open in outlook in my case.

Thanks! this worked running the following script:

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain local -domain system -domain user