'Always' not 'just once' by accident... This should be simple!

[Tinkerbell8]

I clicked on a photo about two hours ago, thinking I'd selected gallery from the options that came up (eg gallery, snapseed, pixlr, canva, print, etc) and made the apparently unforgivable error of mistakenly pressing 'always' instead of 'just once'

I've clearly been judged & sent to Samsung purgatory, as I'm now tearing my hair out & no nearer to reversing this. Please help 🙏

I've tried what numerous folks online suggest & cleared defaults from gallery. And cleared the cache. Forced stop. Restarted the phone. Nada. 

I've been through every other app that could possibly deal with photos in case I selected the wrong one as well as the wrong 'always', & I've cleared those. 

Admitting default I then did the one suggestion I was avoiding because it's such overkill for a simple mistake, and reset app preferences, which in theory has reset everything - my app preferences, my notifications, a royal pain in the butt. & Yes, I've restarted the phone about three times now. 

Except its not done the one thing that I wanted 😭 I still have no options to open pictures, just this weird very plain view of the image, it's def not in gallery, I don't recognise the app & I can't see a way to add a screenshot to this post? 

Any help would be truly appreciated, I literally will be awake tonight with sheer frustration 😬

[Robin999]

Just open a picture as normal and whatever app opens it (there should be only one) will be the one you need to address. It should be easy to tell which app is opening them?

[Tinkerbell8]

Unfortunately it's not - it's like a plain page with the image name at the top if I open one from an email. If I try to click on a photo in my gallery which previously would have brought up the menu of apps with the always or just once option, now I get nothing at all.

I can use the share button as a workaround but it's really frustrating 🤔

[Robin999]

So what you're saying is you can't open any pictures at all. It doesn't open them and doesn't give the options of which app to use.

Can you try clearing your cache partition

Plug into a working PC/Laptop or other working device.

https://www.samsung.com/uk/support/mobile-devices/how-do-i-clear-the-cache-on-my-device/

[Tinkerbell8]

Thanks so much for your help. I've done this. Sadly no change. This is indescribably irritating, It's so illogical that a simple mistake can be so hard to undo! 🙃

[Tinkerbell8]

This is what I get if I try to open an image from an email.. No options at all

[MontyS23U]

How to change default app?
Head to System Settings, specifically the Applications section. Here you should find the Choose default application menu (it may be named differently in different versions of Android and its extensions), where you can choose a different default tool for specific processes.
Another option is to completely delete the saved presets. In practice, this change will result in the default application not automatically opening when you try to open a supported link or function. The user will again be offered a menu with a list of usable programs.