Are changing fonts still an issue?

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Sapperdeflap
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Joined: August 29th, 2017, 12:39 am

Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by Sapperdeflap »

Hello everybody,

Years ago I was very happy using Thunderbird but because of this one issue I had with changing fonts I changed to Outlook. Now that Outlook is ending support for Outlook 2007 and because they have this highly annoying feature of "unusual activity detection" which blocks all my Outlook mail addresses since I started ProtonVPN last week, I want to return to Thunderbird.

Let me tell you what issue I had. It's been a while, the support forum I was on - getsatisfaction.com - is no longer, so I cannot retrieve the information. This was it: more often than not, after sending a mail the fonts changed and my sent mail looked awful with one sentence/paragraph right, the next in a different font or size. I had to change to Outlook because I couldn't send business mails like that. People on that forum helped me a lot but we weren't able to fix it. It was a known issue, something to do with an error in the basic configuration, if that is the correct word. The odd thing was that not all people had this issue. A friend of mine uses T-bird and says he doesn't have it.

I still have T-bird running as a sort of emergency backup with just one email address, and because T-bird shows my animated smilies (just like the ones you have, I imported them in mails from which I can copy them) as animated and not as stationary as Outlook does, so I can check how they look before I send them. Yeah, I love my smilies. :D

Also, I assume a lot has changed since I used T-bird and I must say I'm dreading the idea that I have to find out everything again. So if anyone is willing to help me out a bit by directing me to the right places in a structured way, that would be wonderful.

But before I start out on this "expotition" :D , I'd like to know whether this font issue is still happening with people.

Thanks for reading all this.
Whoever controls the narrative controls the world.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by tanstaafl »

I haven't heard of that problem for a very long time. Did this only occur when replying to a sent HTML message?
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Sapperdeflap
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by Sapperdeflap »

Well, that's good news, tanstaafl! Maybe something was done about it in the meantime. No, it happened in my own drafts and upon replying, anytime. It was terrible. I remembered mentioning it in emails to a friend and I looked it up just now and see that I started using T-bird early 2013 and right away I had this issue. I remember that it was at its worst when I did some copy/pasting with other pieces of texts or images and such. Often it looked good in the draft but changed after sending. So that was highly unreliable. It got a bit better when I installed the QuoteAndComposeManager add-on, remember that one? :) Is that one still valid? Or did another add-on do the trick?

I hope more people can assure me that it's no longer an issue.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by tanstaafl »

I've used the quoteandcomposemanager add-on at https://freeshell.de/~kaosmos/quoteandc ... er-en.html several times when a regression bug broke the quote code in Thunderbird. I never used the "option to stabilize predefinied font in replies and forwards;"

"I remember that it was at its worst when I did some copy/pasting with other pieces of texts or images and such."
That may have been a self inflicted problem, due to you copying some HTML commands to change the font without realizing it. When possible try copying and pasting into the Insert -> HTML windows so that you can see and edit any HTML that changes the font. Or copy and paste text into notepad, and then select it and copy and paste it into Thunderbird. That will strip any HTML tags since Notepad is too dumb to support HTML. With images I'd try dragging and dropping them rather than copying and pasting a section of text that includes the image, if you run into problems.
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Sapperdeflap
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by Sapperdeflap »

If I copy/paste anything in Outlook or Word which changes the default font/size I can just change it back and there is never an issue with different HTMLs. I remember now that it has to do with points instead of pixels too.

I appreciate your suggestions very much and will definitely try them. Thank so much. I don't know what you mean by the Insert -> HTML windows though. Could you clarify that?

I did some testing using different fonts and copy/pasting texts. A few fonts worked like Courier and Times. Others like Calibri and Lucida Handwriting didn't work. Maybe I'm doing something wrong or have the wrong settings. Would you mind helping me out? First thing though is that my Thunderbird is set to Dutch which makes it difficult for me to write about specific terms. Can I temporarily change to English without using the settings I have now?
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tanstaafl
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by tanstaafl »

"I don't know what you mean by the Insert -> HTML windows though. Could you clarify that? "

Its a menu command in the toolbar of the compose message window, that is only present if you are writing a HTML message. It's meant to let you enter HTML tags. However, it can also be used to see/edit existing HTML tags by selecting a part of the message using the mouse and then clicking on Insert -> HTML.

"First thing though is that my Thunderbird is set to Dutch which makes it difficult for me to write about specific terms. Can I temporarily change to English without using the settings I have now?"

You can enter text in different languages while keeping the same "locale". The locale specifies the language/cultural conventions used by the user interface. My Father used to write some messages in German while using a English version (locale) of Thunderbird. There was enough overlap between the letters used by the two languages that I think he just configured Windows to support the international US character layout as described in https://www.lifewire.com/international- ... il-1173263 so that he could type characters such as ß and é using the ALT key without having to memorize three digit numbers. Since he installed a German dictionary add-on he could also spell check German text, after selecting the appropriate dictionary. While he could have installed an add-on to let him change the locale to German, that wouldn't have helped as the real problem was how to easily enter German characters using a English keyboard.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunde ... er/?src=ss (change language and conventions used by user interface)
http://kb.mozillazine.org/International_characters (make it easier to enter text in different languages)
https://superuser.com/questions/110605/ ... in-windows
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Sapperdeflap
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by Sapperdeflap »

Insert >> HTML window: I see. That's very useful for people who know the HTML "language". I have too much on my plate to take that on. Moreover, isn't it laborious to edit every concept mail like that?

I searched through the add-ons available but couldn't find anything. On the Mozilla Support site I came across this topic which discusses copying problems when using a concept mail made in Word (which I would do to avoid my issues with TB):

https://support.mozilla.org/nl/questions/1161578?fpa=1

So no solution was given but it mentions that it was perfectly possible in the past. Maybe a future TB version repairs that?

I looked a bit into using templates but that still wouldn't solve my issues, I think. But would that be an option to stabilize fonts/sizes more?

With all due respect, tanstaafl, I find it odd that an email client offers quite a number of more complex editing controls but lacks the basic things like choosing line spacing and the problem-free and easy use of fonts and sizes, or the undo/redo button which I use all the time in Word. Do I understand correctly that TB uses HTML and Word uses Rich Text and that accounts for the differences in use?

About the language: I'm sorry, my question was unclear. I meant changing the language of TB itself, so I can ask questions about TB using the right terms like Options, Tools etc. without having to look for translations all the time. I found this add-on: Simple Locale Switcher. Would that be an option?

I also saw ReplyWithHeader. That's cool because I copy mails to my Word archive files and I don't like the TB's header. Although using add-ons now are shaky because of the new Firefox 57 coming up. I assume you know about that.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by tanstaafl »

"Do I understand correctly that TB uses HTML and Word uses Rich Text and that accounts for the differences in use?"

No. The difference is that Thunderbird's built-in HTML editor is basically the Netscape Composer HTML editor created for the Netscape 6 browser in 1997. A few minor changes have been made to it but no attempts to overhaul it. Instead there have been several attempts to replace it with a modern HTML editor widget but they have failed due to either lack of resources or it turning out the widget they chose was too tough to integrate. There was an external editor add-on that would let you use an HTML editor with Thunderbird but its no longer maintained and broke with version 52.

"About the language: I'm sorry, my question was unclear. I meant changing the language of TB itself, so I can ask questions about TB using the right terms like Options, Tools etc. without having to look for translations all the time. I found this add-on: Simple Locale Switcher. Would that be an option?"

Yes. The changing locales section of http://kb.mozillazine.org/International_characters mentions it and another one.
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Sapperdeflap
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Re: Are changing fonts still an issue?

Post by Sapperdeflap »

Forgive me, tanstaafl, for my late reply. Have been crazy busy.

I thought about it and decided to leave TB alone again. At least for the moment. Am looking into other email clients.

But I'm much the wiser and very grateful for your help. Thank you! :D
Whoever controls the narrative controls the world.
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