[Alpine-info] Forwarded mail partially invisible in Outlook

[Eduardo Chappa]

On Mon, 19 Feb 2024, Olaf Skibbe wrote:


> On Mon, 19 Feb 2024 at 11:21, Eduardo Chappa wrote:

>

>> The problem is not Alpine, the problem is the outlook interface.

>

> Just to avoid any misunderstandings: I used the Outlook web interface 

> (OWA), but the same behavior can be observed by the (locally installed) 

> Outlook mail client.


I do not know the exchange protocol, so I cannot tell you how that client 
works. The owa client only requests a part of the message, it has no idea 
that there are html and plain text parts.


>>  When a message is exported through the web, the default is to export 

>> certain parts but not all. In theory the full message could be 

>> exported, but the default is to export a part of it. What I mean is 

>> that when you open the message to read it the client has a choice, they 

>> can either pick the html part (default) or the text/plain part. The 

>> latter has to be requested explicitly. You could get both, but that 

>> would be slow, or you could request the full message (even slower), so 

>> guess what the Outlook interface is doing: Picking up the default, that 

>> is the HTML part.

>

> Yes, I understand this. But I assume there is more to it. There are many 

> clients which can be defaulted to show the HTML part.


That is not what I said. In the IMAP protocol the client is given a full 
description of the message. In the POP protocol the client is given the 
full message. In OWA the client has no idea about the structure of the 
message in regards to alternative parts.


> All clients I know of (including Outlook) would show the text/plain part 

> when a mail contains only this.


If the access is through IMAP and POP they can do that. If they download 
the full message (which can be done in OWA) they can do that. It is not 
about the client, it is a combination of protocol and client.


> All clients I know of (excluding Outlook) would show the text/plain 

> part, if this is the only content part of the actual mail, even if an 

> attached mail contains an HTML part. They can distinguish between the 

> actual mail text and the attachment. (I assume this depends of the 

> declaration of the parts?)

>

> Even Outlook can do this. When I add only an inline picture, *or* when I 

> add only an attached file to the mail which is to be forwarded, Outlook 

> behaves fine and displays the text/plain part of the actual mail 

> *together* with the HTML part of the forwarded mail.

>

> But obviously, when the mail which is to be forwarded contains the right 

> choice of attachments (inline picture *and* attached file), Outlook can 

> be tricked into not showing the text/plain part of the actual mail.


I just tried to explain to you how OWA works. It is more involved than the 
explanation I gave you. Different situations lead to different results, 
but for the situation you presented I gave you the explanation. I hope 
that helps you a bit.

-- 
Eduardo