Set Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo or ZoHo Mail As Default Mail Application In Ubuntu 10.04

Evolution is a great full featured email client, but I don't want to use it on my netbook. It's really frustrating clicking on email links and seeing the Evolution configuration wizard pop up.

In an earlier post I wrote a guide about setting Gmail/Yahoo! as your default mail client in Firefox, but it only worked in Firefox and the settings were not used system wide. This guide will show you how to set Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo! or SoHo Mail as your system wide default mail application using an awesome program called Desktop Webmail.

To install desktop-webmail, in a terminal type:

sudo apt-get install desktop-webmail

Once installed you can find Desktop-Webmail configuration editor under Applications>Internet. Use the pull down menu to select Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail Classic UI, Yahoo! Mail Default or ZoHo Mail.

After setting your webmail prover go to System>Settings>Preferred Applications



and select Desktop Webmail as your Mail Reader.

Feeling left out because you're running an older version of Ubuntu? Gnome Gmail offers the same service for older versions of Ubuntu, only catch is that it only works for Gmail. You can download an all architecture .deb from the Gnome Gmail sourceforge site.

Gmail>Yahoo!

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Google Is Back as The Default Search Provider for Ubuntu 10.04

Search snobs rejoice, Google is back as the default search engine for Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx. Google>Yahoo!/Bing.

From the the ubuntu-mailing list:

Each release we determine the best default web browser and the best
default search engine for Ubuntu. When choosing the best default search provider, we consider factors such as user experience, user preferences, and costs and benefits for Ubuntu and the browsers and other project that make up Ubuntu. Up until Ubuntu 9.10 these defaults have always been Firefox and Google. Earlier in the 10.04 cycle I announced that we would be changing the default search provider to Yahoo!, and we implemented that change for several milestones.

However, for the final release, we will use Google as the default provider. I have asked the Ubuntu Desktop team to change the default back to Google as soon as reasonably possible, but certainly by final freeze on April 15th.

It was not our intention to "flap" between providers, but the underlying circumstances can change unpredictably. In this case, choosing Google will be familiar to everybody upgrading from 9.10 to 10.04 and the change will only be visible to those who have been part of the
development cycle for 10.04.

Have a question or problem that this article doesn't cover? Ask our Ubuntu Mini 9 Google Group for help.