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Drag and Drop one pager PDF from Apple Mail creates "inetloc"

Hello


When I drag and drop from Apple Mail a one-pager PDF (that is displayed as an image in the email) to the Finder it creates a .pdf.inetloc file that is totally useless.


When the PDF is multi page (displayed as an icon in the email) it creates a correct PDF file in the Finder.


Palliative solution is to open the file in Acrobat and to do a file/"save as", find the folder in finder...

At least 15 clics... no comment.


Please help


Armand



iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on May 10, 2022 5:47 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on May 11, 2022 4:23 PM

Thank you for your answer. But it's not what I want to do, I just want to drag from the email and drop to the open directory of the Finder. Only one action, as I'm used with Apple.

When I do it with in PDF as icon in the email: no issue.

When it's a one pager PDF: there is a image preview of the file inside the email. That's when there is a problem.


Doing many tests I think I may have understood the issue.

1) I have a trackpad not a mouse

2) I'm used to drag and drop doing a soft clic on the trackpad

3) It works perfectly to drag and drop a file under icon in the email

4) But I just understood that if I drag and drop with a soft clic a PDF that is seen as image in the email

    • if I clic on a zone with text it selects a small part of text and (eventually) drop a RTF file !!!
    • if I clic on the empty part of the image it drops a "inetloc" file
    • if I clic STRONGLY (2nd level): it drags and drop the file as desired --> I didn't know that !!!


So in conclusion: doing this post made me understand the way it works... :-)

As I always did this way without any issue, I imagine it's a novelty of lasts update of macOS (appears to me linked to the ability to select something into the image of the PDF).

Before doing this post I made a lot of research without finding anything, so it might not be documented yet?

I also went to your 2 links without finding it. BUT there is an info saying that if you control+clic on the image of a PDF in Mail you can chose to change it to icon instead of image --> I tried but this option doesn't exist in my French macOS 12.3.1, maybe it's not available anymore?


So finally, question answered, even if not easy to understand why this behavior was changed... = for an icon PDF, soft clic to drag and drop / for an image PDF (one page PDF) strong clic mandatory !!



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9 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

May 11, 2022 4:23 PM in response to leroydouglas

Thank you for your answer. But it's not what I want to do, I just want to drag from the email and drop to the open directory of the Finder. Only one action, as I'm used with Apple.

When I do it with in PDF as icon in the email: no issue.

When it's a one pager PDF: there is a image preview of the file inside the email. That's when there is a problem.


Doing many tests I think I may have understood the issue.

1) I have a trackpad not a mouse

2) I'm used to drag and drop doing a soft clic on the trackpad

3) It works perfectly to drag and drop a file under icon in the email

4) But I just understood that if I drag and drop with a soft clic a PDF that is seen as image in the email

    • if I clic on a zone with text it selects a small part of text and (eventually) drop a RTF file !!!
    • if I clic on the empty part of the image it drops a "inetloc" file
    • if I clic STRONGLY (2nd level): it drags and drop the file as desired --> I didn't know that !!!


So in conclusion: doing this post made me understand the way it works... :-)

As I always did this way without any issue, I imagine it's a novelty of lasts update of macOS (appears to me linked to the ability to select something into the image of the PDF).

Before doing this post I made a lot of research without finding anything, so it might not be documented yet?

I also went to your 2 links without finding it. BUT there is an info saying that if you control+clic on the image of a PDF in Mail you can chose to change it to icon instead of image --> I tried but this option doesn't exist in my French macOS 12.3.1, maybe it's not available anymore?


So finally, question answered, even if not easy to understand why this behavior was changed... = for an icon PDF, soft clic to drag and drop / for an image PDF (one page PDF) strong clic mandatory !!



May 11, 2022 1:01 PM in response to Mouze

Mouze wrote:

Hello

When I drag and drop from Apple Mail a one-pager PDF (that is displayed as an image in the email) to the Finder it creates a .pdf.inetloc file that is totally useless.

When the PDF is multi page (displayed as an icon in the email) it creates a correct PDF file in the Finder.

Palliative solution is to open the file in Acrobat and to do a file/"save as", find the folder in finder...
At least 15 clics... no comment.

Please help

Armand




If you move your mouse to correct central location —an option appears to save attachments—use that and compare your results.







View, save, or delete email attachments in Mail on Mac



Mail User Guide for Mac - Apple Support


May 11, 2022 4:35 PM in response to Mouze

Mouze wrote:

So finally, question answered, even if not easy to understand why this behavior was changed... = for an icon PDF, soft clic to drag and drop / for an image PDF (one page PDF) strong clic mandatory !!



You can try making changes to your trackpad preferences and compare your results:







How to use the Force Touch trackpad - Apple Support


Use Multi-Touch gestures on your Mac - Apple Support

Use Multi-Touch gestures on your Mac - Apple Support


Change Mouse & Trackpad preferences for accessibility on Mac

Change Mouse & Trackpad preferences for accessibility on Mac - Apple Support


Change how your trackpad works with Mac - Apple Support

Change Trackpad preferences on Mac - Apple Support

.


May 11, 2022 4:40 PM in response to Mouze

I can't replicate that behavior. It doesn't matter what I "grab," it always produces a PDF.

Can you describe the setup in more detail. Do they all come from the same source?

I tried with various one page PDFs in my email and all get dropped as PDF.

I tried dragging to folders in Finder windows and directly into the Desktop. The proxy icon and the final file both indicated it was a .pdf file.

Jun 19, 2022 9:05 PM in response to Mouze

I think most of repliers not really understand the question. This problem happened since macOS started can be OCR the text in PDF.


In this case, when we would like to drag the PDF from one apps to other places or apps, it become selecting the text or context inside the PDF, but not the PDF page of preview. This happening seriously in PDF attachment of Mails, also in some other apps too.


We tried to dragging the PDF by pointing the mouse on different place of the PDF, avoiding the text or context. It can be avoiding select the contexts, but when it drag, it drag out the "inetloc", that mean the shortcut of url. I think it was also the "context" of the PDF, but only in the non-readable formation for "User". May be there is something need on the PDF generator version or something else that the above function not really comprehensive. Or the preview of Mail not user friendly enough in this function.


The Point of the question is, if there is any trick, that separated the 2 action, select the contexts, or dragging the PDF, more easily. We are doing this by Drag & Drop, but hope not Save as and Re-Select by others apps.


The success rate of dragging out a PDF file is 1/5 right now. Mostly dragged out inetloc or CID string of the PDF, Sometime nothings.

Drag and Drop one pager PDF from Apple Mail creates "inetloc"

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