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Often times when there's an email address on a website, it is not just plaintext, but a link (hyperlink?). However, instead of containing an address such as https://unix.stackexchange.com it contains mailto:[email protected] which - upon a click - opens a browser "page not found". This seems very useless, however a quick search on the Unix StackExchange suggested that the phrase MAILTO: has some function/meaning on Unix/Linux systems (and maybe on others). Many questions also refer to "cron". While I understand the primary function of "cron" jobs (automatic actions being done at certain times/periods) I have trouble to connect it with the mailto: hyperlinks.

So what is the function of these hyperlinks and is it in any way connected to "cron" jobs - if so, how is it supposed to work?

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They are a URI for an e-mail address that the browser can use to invoke an e-mail application in order to send e-mail to the given address. The browser should provide a configuration option to set the application used.

cron uses the unrelated MAILTO variable (i.e. MAILTO=...) in its configuration to know where to send e-mail with output from the commands it runs rather than sending it all to root.

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  • Thank you, this answer clarified the issue. While I suspected that it should invoke an e-mail application, I was very confused about how cron relates to this. Now I now that the MAILTO variable is unrelated and serves a different function
    – Niteraleph
    Commented May 2, 2018 at 8:21
  • The "mailto" URI scheme is defined in tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6068
    – Patrick Mevzek
    Commented Jul 5, 2018 at 15:35

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