Protocol handler setting to automatically open protocol with xdg-open

On Ubuntu 18.04 when I clicked a Zoom link it automatically opened Zoom for me without prompt. I think that the version of Chrome that I was using on Ubuntu 18.04 had had an option in the xdg-open dialog that I could check which was something like "Always open these links."

I upgraded this machine to Ubuntu 20.04 and that option (if that was what it was) is gone and I cannot discover how to set this protocol to automatically open a Zoom link without the dialog popping up.

Now I understand that this might be more of a Chrome question rather than an Ubuntu question and I ask it here because I am pretty sure that this happened during the upgrade from 18.04 to 20.04 and I feel if I can understand why it happened during the upgrade I could work out how to fix it.

I've tried searching in the Chrome settings but haven't been able to find anything yet. Perhaps there's a config file that Chrome uses on startup that has a setting I could tweak?

1 Answer

A policy was introduced called "ExternalProtocolDialogShowAlwaysOpenCheckbox" () which defaults to false.

There is documentation on how to set it here () but the what worked for me is this:

1. Make the managed policies directory: sudo mkdir -p /etc/opt/chrome/policies/managed/

2. Edit the managed policies: sudo nano /etc/opt/chrome/policies/managed/managed_policies.json

3. Put in the new policy setting:

{ "ExternalProtocolDialogShowAlwaysOpenCheckbox": true
}

4. Close and restart Chrome.
5. You will now see the checkbox and it can be checked like this: