mailto
links (#1010)
Topics/tags: Rants, technology
The other day, I clicked a link on the class roster page Grinnell’s
Blackboard System, officially
known as Pioneer Web
and colloquially referred to as P’Web.
Although my mail reader popped up, as I had expected, the To:
field was incorrect. Here’s what appeared in that field, appropriately
anonymized.
I observed the same behavior whether I used Firefox, Safari, Chrome,
or Opera [1]. Why didn’t the message appear correctly? Some folks
would say that it’s because I’m using a Macintosh. But I believe
the problem is a bit more complex than that. I think it has to do
with how they formatted the mailto
link. Here’s the link that appeared
in the original.
Let’s try a series of experiments. We’ll start with just the basics.
Yup. That works fine.
Now, let’s add the subject. I don’t particularly like the subject that Blackboard chooses, but I’m not going to be picky.
Nope. It all appears in the To
field.
Okay. Let’s check the documentation for mailto URIs. Ah! Start with a question mark, not an ampersand. I knew that. Or at least I should have known that.
Yup. That works. That is, the username@grinnell.edu
appears in
the To:
field and the useless 84607 Course Message
appears in
the subject. Now let’s try the longer one.
That works just like the prior one. I wonder whether I can futz with it?
Nope. It makes no difference. So why do they generate such a long URI? I have no idea. In any case, it’s time to report the issue to ITS so that clicking on the link works appropriately.
Version 1.0 of 2020-02-06.