206522 - html message shows as source, multiple content types (one text/html, one is text/plain), we use the first

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(MailNews Core :: MIME, defect)

Description

[esther]

html message shows as source, multiple content types (one text/html, one is
text/plain), we use the first

so, someone sends us a html message, but with two content types:

Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Type: text/html

we'll display using the first.

Outlook handles this, and we should (if possible).

we should double check with ducarroz (and the RFCs) to see how to handle this case.

Comment 1

[esther]

A user sent me an email that he had to edit to remove confidential data.  He
get's this email regularly as a report, it displays the html as souce in our
mail app, but displays as html in outlook.  The sending app is User-Agent:
Mutt/1.4i,  I do not have this app to see if all outgoing html messages go out
this way or if this is a special case. And I'm not sure if there are other apps
that do this. 

Comment 2

[esther]

To reproduce using our app and altering the file to miminic what the other app
does: 
1.) Send yourself an html message with html attributes (I added a table)
2.) Get the message and move or copy the message to a local folder (I created a
new one called bugtest).
3.) Exit the app
4.) Using a editor, open the file (bugtest) and add this content type
"Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii" above the Content-Type: text/html;
charset=us=ascii"
save the file.  I remove the bugtest.msf file so it will build again when I open
this edited folder.
5.) Launch app again and open the message in the folder bugtest.
Result: the html message displays as text.

Comment 3

[Jim]

Is there a proposed date for completion on this problem?  (I just had two
machines that are forced to use Outlook because of messages with this type of
problem become infected with multiple virii - over 7,000 infections on one
machine.)  I would very much like to dump Outlook and use Mozilla to prevent
this type of situation from recurring.

Comment 4

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

(In reply to comment #1)
> The sending app is User-Agent: Mutt/1.4i, 
> I do not have this app to see if all outgoing html messages go out this
> way or if this is a special case. And I'm not sure if there are other apps
> that do this. 

Mutt is a plain-text mailer, as far as I can tell.

xref bug 338675, a recent case of dual-Content-Type messages.

Comment 5

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

A Mutt user pointed out that if someone were trying to send HTML via Mutt, they could add a custom Content-Type header via the rc file and type in a bunch of HTML in the body.  I tried this; the results are as described in comment 0: Mutt emits its own Content-Type:text/plain first before the custom headers.

It clearly makes little sense to have two Content-Type headers, but RFC1049 doesn't specify that there should be one nor if multiple ones are allowed.


(In reply to comment #3 [[e-mail]])
> I [have] two machines that are forced to use Outlook because of messages
> with this type of problem 

Seriously?  You were getting so many messages like this in the wild that Mozilla was not viable?  Do you still get a lot of messages like this?  Can you provide a sample?  (Save as .EML, attach to bug.)

Comment 6

[Jim]

I sent an example when I first reported this back in May of 2003.  Yes, two users were receiving an automatically generated e-mail that displayed like this from a major company.  These e-mails are mission-critical, so they were using Outlook until this company changed their e-mail system.  (Completely unrelated to this bug; it was a planned update to their software.)  I've saved the attachment that I sent Esther and will attach it to this case for your examination.

Comment 7

[Jim]

Attachment: An example message, edited to remove confidential information

I copied an e-mail to a new folder, then edited the file that was created to replace all confidential information with x's.  This is the file that resulted from that process.

Comment 8

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

And is that message source *still* sending messages like that?

Comment 9

[Jim]

No they are not - as I stated in my last comment, they changed their e-mail system completely.  These messages have been reformatted and come through the web instead of via e-mail now.

Comment 10

[Jesse Houwing]

Attachment: Another example

I am also seeing this, at least once a month. One of the most reputable photographic equipment retailers in The Netherlands uses this order in their monthly newsletters.

I cannot see from the headers of the message which tool they're using for the mass mailings. I could ask though...

Comment 11

[Jesse Houwing]

Hmm must be my headache... :$...

X-Mailer: ecMailer

Though I cannot find any info on this. A google search turned up a couple of log-on boxes from this tool, but no clue to its origins. My guess is that it is no longer supported.

Comment 13

[Max Emig [:maxe]]

The example by Jesse Houwing renders beautifully in Thunderbird 149 (and Daily), while the first example is too heavily censored to properly render.