Closed
Bug 101877
Opened 23 years ago
Closed 21 years ago
"wrap text to fit window width" feature joins shorts lines of text!
Categories
(SeaMonkey :: MailNews: Message Display, defect)
Tracking
(Not tracked)
RESOLVED
INVALID
People
(Reporter: nelson, Assigned: sspitzer)
References
(Blocks 1 open bug)
Details
Attachments
(1 file)
4.57 KB,
text/plain
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Details |
Reporter | ||
Comment 1•23 years ago
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The "wrap text to fit window width" feature should only wrap lines of text that are wider than the window width. It should leave short lines alone. But in plain text email messages, this feature actually lengthens short lines by taking words from the following lines. The problem seems to occur on the first line of a paragraph, that is, on the first line following a blank line. If the first line after a blank line is shorter than the window width, such that there is room on that line to include words from the following line, then a word or words are taken from the following line to lengthen that line.
Summary: "wrap text to fit window → "wrap text to fit window width" feature joins shorts lines of text!
Reporter | ||
Comment 2•23 years ago
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I am using N6.x build 2001091703.
Reporter | ||
Comment 3•23 years ago
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More info about this. The problem of lengthening short lines occurs sometimes even when the "wrap text to fit window width" feature is disabled. I have a plain text message that has several paragraphs that exhibit this line lengthening behavior. With the "wrap text to fit window width" feature enabled, more lines are lengthened than when it is disabled, but some lines are lengthened even when it is disabled. I will attach a copy of the message to this bug. The paragrpah that begins with "I see the problem" is always lengthened by having the first (and only) word from the following line joined to it if the window is wide enough, regardless of the setting of the feature. The very next paragraph has the first word from the second line joined to the first line, but only when the feature is enabled.
Reporter | ||
Comment 4•23 years ago
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Bug 167634 has additional information about this behaviour. This bug is still around, at least in the following versions: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030529 Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030529
See bug 167634, comment 14 and follow-ups in particular.
Comment 8•21 years ago
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Julian (julian[at]sektor37.de) has already mentioned what I was going to write. I'm just adding myself to the CC list. Also, confirming behaviour, as well as the one mentioned in Comment 3, on Windows XP Pro: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030529
I was mistaken, meanwhile it seems like the Viewer component works correctly; instead, there is a bug in outgoing mail. So this bug should probably be marked a duplicate of bug 167634. Bug 167634 comment 22 points to the underlying reasons. Bug 167634 comment 24 attempts to detail the problem in length. Bug 167634 comment 25 is a brief summary of what needs to be done.
Comment 10•21 years ago
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Let me add that Bug 167634 comment 26 points to an attachment that shows that the viewer component works correctly. RFC2646, pointed to by Bug 167634 comment 22 also makes clear why Nelson couldn't explain that sometimes lines were concatenated, sometimes not. I haven't checked, but I bet that mail has whitespace after some lines, and not after others. This still doesn't clarify the role of the "wrap text to fit window width" switch, though.
Reporter | ||
Comment 11•21 years ago
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The message attached above claims to be format flowed, and some lines do and others do not have trailing blanks. You're right that it explains the observed behavior with the message. Thanks for looking into this. But I question the solution proposed in Bug 167634 comment 25. As I understand it you propose to strip all trailing blanks in the outgoing message, making them all fixed length. What sense does it make to send a message that claims to be flowed format, but has all fixed length lines? Why not just change the outgoing message's format parameter to declare the message is fixed format? I like your idea of giving the composer user a button to choose between flowed format and fixed. But then, if the user chooses flowed, then stripping trailing blanks from outgoing text is a bad idea, no? Suggestion: make the "wrap text to line width" pref be a 3-valued preference, with settings : always, never, only when format=flowed.
Comment 12•21 years ago
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The solution I posted in Bug 167634 comment 25 was one possible solution and perhaps a summary too tight. As I mentioned in the long comment, of course stripping the header is another option, and you're right that it's probably the more elegant one (though the outcome should be the same.) I also said there that for format=flowed messages, whitespace must be left. Regarding the setting, are we talking about the same thing? I meant a setting for outgoing mail, you seem to be talking of a setting for the viewer. Perhaps it would be nice to have both, but in the context of bug 167634 it's about wrapping of outgoing mail. Or what do you mean by "only when format=flowed", do you mean the user should choose between plain format and flowed format at one place, and choose the wrapping at a different place?
Comment 13•21 years ago
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Why not make it all in the same place? Add the "wrap text at XX" message along with the third option. Would that work?
Reporter | ||
Comment 14•21 years ago
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There is a mail display preference called "wrap text to fit window width". This bug complains that the mail reader apparently ignores the setting of that preference, continuing to wrap text when the preference says not to. Your comments made it clear that the problem is related to format=flowed, and your last sentence in comment 10 makes it apparent that the meaning of the preference described above is unclear in the presence of flowed format text. So, in comment 11, I suggest that we change the mail display preference to offer these choices (for displaying) - Never wrap text, not even when format=flowed - Alway wrap text, even when format=fixed (explicitly) - Wrap text when format=flowed and not otherwise In bug 167134, you suggested having buttons that tell the composer whether to use format=flowed for format=fixed for outgoing mail. I don't know whether you were proposing a preference or a pair of buttons in the composer window itself. In comment 11, I said I also like this idea. Perhaps I should have put that comment in bug 167134.
Comment 15•21 years ago
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OK, got it now. We are dealing with two different sets of options: one for formatting outgoing mail, and one for wrapping in the viewer component. The options for outgoing mail should be/have been discussed in bug 167634. For the viewer component you suggested the following three options: - Never wrap text, not even when format=flowed - Alway wrap text, even when format=fixed (explicitly) - Wrap text when format=flowed and not otherwise I'm not sure how useful the first option "never wrap" is. Format=flowed is all about wrapping at the receiver end, so I don't think non-wrapped display of a (properly formatted) format=flowed message makes any sense. Therefore I'd like to suggest to wrap format=flowed messages in any case, and have the following preference for format=fixed messages: [X] Force wrapping of preformatted messages (checkbox) This corresponds to your suggestion, without the "never wrap" option. I would suggest "preformatted" (sp?) as a user-friendly way of denoting format=fixed messages, but perhaps someone can come up with a better label. I think the default should be "do not force wrapping of preformatted messages" (checkbox disabled.)
Reporter | ||
Comment 16•21 years ago
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Julian wrote:
> I don't think non-wrapped display of a (properly formatted) format=flowed
> message makes any sense.
OK, but that choice is to make the message readable when it contains an
improperly formatted format=flowed message, like the one that triggered
this bug report in the first place. That's precisely what I want.
So, the rest of your proposal doesn't work for me.
Comment 17•21 years ago
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Yes, you're right. I didn't think of that. (following copied from bug 167634) See bug 168420. Seems like there's a LOT to say about format=flowed. I still think something is wrong with the system, probably the viewer. It's kind of unnatural that the viewer concatenates only full text lines, not on the word level. I think that's not how RFC2646 is meant.
Comment 18•21 years ago
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I would like to distinguish between "wrapping" and "flowing" -- "flowing" occurs with an f=f message (and with f=f display enabled), where lines are joined; "wrapping" occurs where the flow of text is broken from one line to the next. A flowed line often should be wrapped (to a column, or to the window edge). Nelson Bolyard: if I understand your comment 16 correctly, you want to see Mozilla flow lines even if they are improperly coded with f=f. I don't know that this is possible. You are asking that Mozilla distinguish between: This is my paragraph, which is flowing and flowing# and flowing, and I end it here! And start a new paragraph here... and This is my paragraph, which should flow except I inadvertantly# type Enter here! but I really wanted the paragraph to continue with this line... (where # indicates a trailing space on the line, and ! indicates a hard break). I don't believe it can be done in a way that wouldn't screw up other people's specifically-formatted mail. I am inclined to mark this bug as Invalid, as I did with bug 167634, but if you have a specific proposal to get the behavior you want, please post it here.
Reporter | ||
Comment 19•21 years ago
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Mike, I am definitely not proposing what you think. 25 months ago, when I wrote this bug, there was no way (AFAIK) to disable flowing in the composer or in the mail viewer. I incorrectly believed that the "wrap text to fit window width" preference for the mail viewer also controlled flowing, and that disabling wrapping would/should also disable flowing, but I observed that it did not, and I thought that was a bug. In essence, what I wanted was a way to disable flowing, so that when one read a received email that was an improperly-formatted flowed message, one could read it as if it had not been marked format=flowed. I thought that turning off wrapping should do that. In the end, what I want is the ability to disable the flowing of text in the display of a received flowed message. I want to be able to change this on a message by message basis, without having to change a preference, just as one can now change the "text zoom" or "character set" for each message. (I'd similarly like to be able to enable/disable wrapping without changing a preference). If there is now, 25 months later, a way to disable flowing in the mail reader (I'm not discussing the composer), then I suppose this bug can be marked fixed or worksforme. Oh, feel free to change the subject of this bug as "no way to disable flowed format in mail viewer".
Comment 20•21 years ago
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It is certainly possible to disable flowed support, but not terribly convenient (see bug 86607). These two preferences control it: mailnews.display.disable_format_flowed_support controls f=f in display mailnews.send_plaintext_flowed controls f=f in composition The first is the one you want. You can set the value by going to the browser and visiting about:config then type 'flowed' into the filter field. Double-click the preference, and set it to "true" -- then reload the message. And so with that, I will resolve this bug as Invalid. Thanks for letting us know.
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 21 years ago
Resolution: --- → INVALID
Reporter | ||
Comment 21•21 years ago
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I disagree that this bug is invalid. It was fixed by the addition of a new feature in the 25 months after it was filed, namely, a feature to explicitly control format=flowed in display.
Updated•20 years ago
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Product: Browser → Seamonkey
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Description
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