Mike Chambers

code = joy

Adobe AIR / Firefox issue on Vista

with 25 comments

One of the issue mentioned in our the Adobe AIR 1.1 release notes is an issue where Firefox is not used as the default web browser on Vista. From the technote:

On Windows Vista, web pages opened from AIR applications (this is done by calling the navigateToURL() method) may not open the default browser; it always opens Internet Explorer. To workaround this problem, go to Start > Default Programs > Set Program Access and Computer Defaults. Expand the Custom section, select the option next to the application you want to set as the system-wide default browser (for example, Mozilla Firefox), and then click OK.

As the note mentions, this is an issue on Vista. We are working on narrowing down the issue, and it looks like it has something to do with some changes around registry settings in Vista.

If you have run into the issue, could you take a second and answer the following questions in the comments:

  1. Are you running on Vista?
  2. Are you running with admin privledges?
  3. Do you have UAC (Universal Access control) enabled?
  4. Is Firefox set as your default browser?
  5. If you go to a command prompt and type “start http://www.google.com”, which browser opens?
  6. Are you running on Firefox 3

This will help us confirm what we think the issue is (as well as whether it is an AIR, Mozilla and / or Vista issue).

Ill update the post as I get more info. Also, please keep the comments on topic for this post.

Update (September 3, 2008) : If you are running into this issue, please try the fix mentioned in this blog post (substituting you default browser for Google Chrome), and leave a comment indicating whether it fixed the issue.

Update (September 3, 2008): There is another potential fix here.

Update (November 17, 2008) : These issues have now bee fixed in Adobe AIR 1.5.

Written by mikechambers

July 9th, 2008 at 3:11 pm

Posted in General

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25 Responses to 'Adobe AIR / Firefox issue on Vista'

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  1. 1. Yes
    2. Yes (local admin)
    3. No
    4. No
    5. IE7

    note if i change to FF as my default, 5=FF opens.

    timheuer

    9 Jul 08 at 3:22 pm

  2. @timheuer

    Thanks. I just added one more question just to be sure, but are you running Firefox 3?

    thanks…

    mike chambers

    mesh@adobe.com

    mikechambers

    9 Jul 08 at 3:26 pm

  3. I have a stranger issue. Open a link from my Adobe application (on winxp) and the link gets opened by Ultraedit (my default html editor).

    Maybe it is a related issue…

    funkyboy

    9 Jul 08 at 4:26 pm

  4. 1. Yes
    2. Yes
    3. Yes
    4. Yes
    5. FF3
    6. Yes

    Smily

    9 Jul 08 at 5:02 pm

  5. 1. Yes (Ultimate)
    2. No
    3. Yes
    4. Yes
    5. Firefox 3
    6. Yes

    I fixed this issue on my machine a few weeks ago (was driving me crazy, I blamed Vista and not AIR). This would have been before FF3 was released. But if memory serves the answer to question 5 at the time would have been FF2.

    Jason

    9 Jul 08 at 5:25 pm

  6. 1. Yes
    2. Yes
    3. No
    4. Yes
    5. FF3
    6. Yes

    TJ Downes

    9 Jul 08 at 6:18 pm

  7. 1. No and i’m realy happy :)

    Zwolu

    9 Jul 08 at 11:43 pm

  8. I am having a similar problem as funkyboy but on Mac OS X 10.4.11. All links in Tweetr(an AIR Twitter client) try to open in TextMate(a text editor).

    So..

    1. No
    2. Yes
    3. I have what I think is the OS X equivalent enabled: “Enable Access for Assistive Devices”. Just a guess about similarity there, though.
    4. Yes
    5. “open http://www.google.com” opens Firefox
    6. Yes

    Seth Thomas Rasmussen

    10 Jul 08 at 7:17 am

  9. 1. Yes ( Business, running within parallels on a mac)
    2. Yes
    3. Dunno – “UAC (Universal Access control)”? I do get “User Access Control” prompts to click through
    4. no
    5. Safari
    6. No – it currently only has Firefox 2

    Even if the default browser (safari) is open at a google page, navigateToURL from my freshly compiled and installed AIR app does indeed launch IE to display the page.

    creacog

    10 Jul 08 at 10:54 am

  10. So this solution worked for me on Vista. Now on my XP Home machine I installed Tweetdeck and it opens all URLs in Ultraedit (text editor). I can only guess that it has to do with htm and html files being associated with Ultraedit.

    1. No (XP Home)
    2. Yes
    3. No
    4. Yes
    5. Firefox
    6. Yes

    Gil Creque

    11 Jul 08 at 11:51 am

  11. 1. Yes
    2. Yes
    3. No
    4. Yes
    5. Firefox
    6. Yes, FF3

    Abhijeet
    http://www.lifeiscolourful.com

    Abhijeet

    13 Jul 08 at 5:22 am

  12. 1) Yes
    2) Yes
    3) Yes
    4) Yes
    5) FireFox
    6) Yes

    Jason

    13 Jul 08 at 6:41 pm

  13. 1) Yes
    2) Yes
    3) No
    4) Yes
    5) FireFox
    6) No

    Links from almost everywhere open in FF. Links in e-mail from Outlook open in Firefox. Links from AIR apps always open in IE.

    After following your steps and doing this (I could swear I’ve done this before) it does appear to have fixed the problem.

    Jonathan Branam

    14 Jul 08 at 12:13 pm

  14. 1. Are you running on Vista? No, MacOS Leopard 10.5.4
    2. Are you running with admin privledges? Not normally.
    3. Do you have UAC (Universal Access control) enabled? N
    4. Is Firefox set as your default browser? Yes
    5. If you go to a command prompt and type “start http://www.google.com”, which browser opens? Typing “open http://www.google.com” starts Firefox
    6. Are you running on Firefox 3 Yes.

    Martin Cleaver

    14 Jul 08 at 5:06 pm

  15. 1) Yes
    2) Yes
    3) NO
    4) Yes
    5) FireFox
    6) Yes

    furkan

    17 Jul 08 at 3:33 am

  16. 1. No – OSX Leapord
    2. Yes
    3. No idea, how do I tell?
    4. Yes
    5. FF3 (using “open http://google.com” in terminal)
    6. Yes (3.0.1 as of today)

    The links to FF3 tab works fine on my XP sp3 just not on my macbook.

    Chuck Reynolds

    17 Jul 08 at 1:06 pm

  17. 1. Yes (business)
    2. Yes
    3. No
    4. No
    5. Firefox 3
    6. Yes

    Chad Upton

    31 Jul 08 at 9:55 am

  18. 1) Yes
    2) Yes
    3) NO
    4) Yes
    5) FireFox
    6) Yes

    Tim Striegel

    3 Aug 08 at 11:32 pm

  19. 1. Are you running on Vista?
    Yes.

    2. Are you running with admin privledges?
    Yes.

    3. Do you have UAC (Universal Access control) enabled?
    No.

    4. Is Firefox set as your default browser?
    Yes.

    5. If you go to a command prompt and type “start http://www.google.com”, which browser opens?
    Firefox.

    6. Are you running on Firefox 3
    Originally, no — FF2.0. Upgraded to FF3.1 earlier today and still encountered issue. However, at some point this afternoon (after I reinstalled TweetDeck) the problem no longer occurred.

    Cristos Lianides-Chin

    12 Aug 08 at 1:09 pm

  20. 1. No, Windows XP Pro SP2
    2. Yes
    3. No (Win XP)
    4. Yes
    5. FF
    6. Yes

    I’m using TweetDeck but all links open in IE6 (i don’t have IE7, i still use IE6 for webdesign). Do you or anyone else know what it could be?
    If someone can help me to fix it feel free to mail me (schmitz.tho @ gmail.com) or tweet me @ThorstenSchmitz ;)

    Thorsten Schmitz

    24 Aug 08 at 2:56 pm

  21. [...] AIR applications do not use the default browser to launch URLs on Vista [...]

    Adobe AIR 1.5 (”Cosmo”) builds now in Flex SDK Nightly builds at Mike Chambers

    11 Sep 08 at 12:14 pm

  22. [...] var numpara = 7; var tb_middle_chotusa = false; tb_to_do_or_to_not(1225359840, ‘middle’, 3052); This issue happens because even though you may have changed your default browser a registry entry pointing to the the .htm class type has not been updated by Windows. To read more about this issue visit Adobe Air / Firefox issue on Vista. [...]

    Adobe Air Applications Not Opening Links In Default Browser [Fix]

    30 Oct 08 at 3:44 am

  23. Note: IE still opens instead of FF after instaling AIR 1.5

    1. Are you running on Vista? no: windows XP
    2. Are you running with admin privledges? I think so
    3. Do you have UAC (Universal Access control) enabled? no
    4. Is Firefox set as your default browser? yes
    5. If you go to a command prompt and type “start http://www.google.com”, which browser opens? FF
    6. Are you running on Firefox 3? no, FF 2.0.18

    Laurent

    18 Nov 08 at 1:59 pm

  24. 1. Yes
    2. Yes
    3. No idea
    4. Yes
    5. If you go to a command prompt and type “start http://www.google.com”, which browser opens?
    6. Yes

    Tgruber

    25 Nov 08 at 10:00 am

  25. [...] AIR applications do not use the default browser to launch URLs on Vista [...]

    Adobe AIR 1.5 codename Cosmo has been released | Ramoonus.nl

    25 Dec 08 at 4:10 am

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