How to change default email client in Dynamics NAV?

Question

We are switching from Ms Outlook to Lotus Notes as our default email client. The problem I have is that some customize button to print and send PDF are not longer working and instead return this message: "Either there is no default mail client or the current mail client cannot fulfill the messaging request. Please run Microsoft Outlook and set it as the default mail client"

What I tried so far was

1. Change the default email client in the ControlPanel --> DefaultPrograms --> Set Your Default Programs settings and made my Lotus Notes Mail and then clicked on the "Set this program as default".
2. This did not work, so I went back into the same settings but instead clicked on "Set program access and computer defaults", from there I went under the section of default e-mail program and chose Lotus Notes, still no go.
3. Went into regedit navigated to "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Associations\UrlAssociations\mailto\UserChoice" changed the key "Progid" (of type REG_SZ) to the value of "LotusNotes.URL.mailto"
4. Googled it a lot but still cannot find anything that is working.

Dynamics NAV seems to have the Outlook very deep inside it, but I really have no choice but to switch to Lotus Notes. Any help would be appreciate. We also have both Windows 7 and Windows XP at our location.

EDIT: Looking into the codeunit has the function call of Mail.NewMessage() which again was working correctly with Outlook but I can't get it to work with Lotus Notes

Answer 1

The short answer, current versions of Microsoft Dynamics NAV are specifically integrated with Outlook not just an e-mail client.

To get the same type of integration as Outlook you need to start with the automation variables within the Mail Codeunit point to Outlook specific controls, the first step is to augment or replace those automation controls to the equivalent ones for the version of Lotus that you are running.

You will then need to review each function call within the Mail Codeunit to ensure that the function has the same method signature in Lotus as it does in Outlook and adjust each function accordingly.

Changes like this require the Solution Builder license granule and modify access to the core application codeunits. This tends to require a Microsoft Solution Center and is not likely to be a small modification.

If you are purely looking to send E-Mail then you can adjust the logic to use Codeunit 400 which is just SMTP and should use any SMTP client that can be located on the network.

Depending on the Version of NAV you are running different versions of office are supported:

• Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2009 (SP1/R2)

  Microsoft Office 2003, Service Pack 3 or later the 2007 Microsoft Office system, Service Pack 1

• Microsoft Dynamics 2013

  Microsoft Office 2013 or Microsoft Office 2010 is required for mail merge. Microsoft Office 2013, Microsoft Office 2010, or Microsoft Office 2007 SP1 is required for Outlook client integration, budget import and export to and from Microsoft Excel and Office XML, and SharePoint links