260773 - german Umlauts don't work with -compose "body=öäü"

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 384160

(Thunderbird :: Message Compose Window, defect)

Description

[birdy]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; rv:1.7.3) Gecko/20040914 Firefox/0.10
Build Identifier: Thunderbird 0.8

If Thunderbird is closed an I call
thnuderbird -compose "body=öäü"
The characters are diplayed wrong. While they are display correctly if a window
is open and I call 
thunderbird  -a Thunderbird -raise -remote "xfedocommand(composemessage,body=öäü)"


Reproducible: Always
Steps to Reproduce:
call: thnuderbird -compose "body=öäü"

Actual Results:  
Window opends but "äöü" is displayed

Expected Results:  
"öäü" is displayed

Comment 1

[Egon Andersen]

I've experienced a similar, but opposite problem when I use danisk letters like æøå.
I've found that the problem exists in both Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.2 and in
Mozilla Suite 1.7.8.

My experience is that I get correctly formattet text in subject and body in the
first mail opened by:
thunderbird -compose
to='[e-mail]',subject='Test%2Dindberetning',body='Test%20l%C3%B8nk%C3%B8rsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt'

Where as when I open a second e-mail (now requiring -remote) with the following
command:
thunderbird -remote
"xfeDoCommand(composeMessage,to='[e-mail]',subject='Test%2Dindberetning',body='Test%20l%C3%B8nk%C3%B8rsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt')"

In this second case I get the exact url-encoded string elements, not transformed
or anything.

For me it seems to some extend that the mozilla-family expects different
encodings depending on whether -compose or -remote is used.
I've tried different character-set encodings in those two cases too, but without
being able to make it show right in the second case.

Comment 2

[Egon Andersen]

I can reproduce the problems the original reporter mentioned.
I use the url-encoding, because I have spaces in the elements, which otherwise
causes thunderbird to report 'to many arguments', if they at not url-encoded.
My examples unfortunetely had utf8 converted directly to url-encoding, but even
if it is iso-8859-1 that is converted to url-encoding, the problem exists.
In the case -compose is used, special characters are not handled as expected.
In the case -remote is used, url-encoding is not handled.
I all cases I get errors if the string elements contains spaces, even though
they are enclosed in ''.

The above is intended as further information to my previous comment.

Comment 3

[Gervase Markham [:gerv]]

This is an automated message, with ID "auto-resolve01".

This bug has had no comments for a long time. Statistically, we have found that
bug reports that have not been confirmed by a second user after three months are
highly unlikely to be the source of a fix to the code.

While your input is very important to us, our resources are limited and so we
are asking for your help in focussing our efforts. If you can still reproduce
this problem in the latest version of the product (see below for how to obtain a
copy) or, for feature requests, if it's not present in the latest version and
you still believe we should implement it, please visit the URL of this bug
(given at the top of this mail) and add a comment to that effect, giving more
reproduction information if you have it.

If it is not a problem any longer, you need take no action. If this bug is not
changed in any way in the next two weeks, it will be automatically resolved.
Thank you for your help in this matter.

The latest beta releases can be obtained from:
Firefox:     http://www.mozilla.org/projects/firefox/
Thunderbird: http://www.mozilla.org/products/thunderbird/releases/1.5beta1.html
Seamonkey:   http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/

Comment 4

[Egon Andersen]

I can still reproduce the problem in both Mozilla Thunderbird and Mozilla Suite.
Nothing has changed and is reproducable every time I try.

Comment 5

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

(In reply to comment #4)
> I can still reproduce the problem in both Mozilla Thunderbird and 
> Mozilla Suite.
> Nothing has changed and is reproducable every time I try.

Which version(s) are you reporting this against?

Under Windows, when I run Thunderbird 1.0.7 with
   tb.exe -compose "body=öäü"
I get the expected results.  My default outgoing charset is ISO-8859-1.

With Thunderbird 1.5b2-1006, that same command results in an empty message body.
In fact, none of the old-style -compose arguments seem to be working with 
TB 1.5; I don't know if this is by design or not.  However, the URL form:
   tb.exe -compose mailto:?body=öäü
does work as expected with TB 1.5 and TB 1.0.

I suspect this is a problem specific to Linux, and perhaps specific to the 
-remote form of the command.  I'm not set up for Linux, so I can't test further.

xref bug 298000

Comment 6

[Egon Andersen]

As the report is written against Linux OS and the -remote is a Linux/Unix
specific option/feature, I'm not surprised that you don't see it on M$ products.
When I wrote the last comment I was using Thunderbird 1.0.6 and Mozilla Suite
1.7.11 on FC3.

Comment 7

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

(In reply to comment #6)
> As the report is written against Linux OS and the -remote is a Linux/Unix
> specific option/feature, I'm not surprised that you don't see it on M$
> products.

Note that the *original* report claims a problem with a command line that is (or 
used to be, anyway) supported in Windows, but stated that there is *not* a 
problem with the -remote command line.  It's therefore reasonable to check that 
Windows is or isn't handling the same thing.

Whereas your comment 1 and comment 2 aren't exactly discussing the same thing, 
since your problem seems to be with %-escaped spaces and 8-bit characters ("url 
encoding").  (Note that comment 2 would have been more useful if you'd provided 
actual command lines that don't work, rather than trying to describe them.)


> When I wrote the last comment I was using Thunderbird 1.0.6 and Mozilla Suite
> 1.7.11 on FC3.

Well, download a current build -- TB 1.5b2 or 1.6a1, Seamonkey 1.0a or 1.1a -- 
and let us know the details of those builds under Linux with both of the command 
lines listed in comment 5.  Also, please state which encoding is used in the 
compose window when it opens, and what sort of locale information you have set, 
i.e., whether the Linux command line is interpreted as an 8-bit (ISO-8859-x) or 
Unicode/UTF string.


Regarding -remote, see also bug 259305.

Comment 8

[Egon Andersen]

Unfortunately I can't install Seamonkey on my Fedora Core 4, as I get error about different versions of some C++ libraries:
./mozilla-installer-bin: error while loading shared libraries: libstdc++.so.5: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Fedora Core 4 uses libstdc++.so.6
-----
Thunderbird 1.5b2 gives the same problem:
./mozilla-installer-bin: error while loading shared libraries: libstdc++.so.5: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Again because Fedora Core 4 uses libstdc++.so.6
-----
I've tried with the latest Mozilla Suite 1.7.12 with:
/usr/local/mozilla_1.7.12/mozilla -compose to='[e-mail]',subject='Test lønindberetning',body='Test lønkørsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt'

Giving an e-mail, where the subject contains:
Test lønindberetning

The body contains:
Test lønkørsel

The environment on the system uses:
LANG=da_DK.UTF-8

The character encoding in Mozilla Suite is:
Western (ISO-8859-1)
-----
When Mozilla Suite is already running I use: 
/usr/local/mozilla_1.7.12/mozilla -remote "xfeDoCommand(composeMessage, to='[e-mail]',subject='Test lønindberetning',body='Test lønkørsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt')"

In this case the subject contains:
Test lønindberetning

The body contains:
Test lønkørsel

The character encoding is still:
Western (ISO-8859-1)
-----
Trying:
/usr/local/mozilla_1.7.12/mozilla -compose "body=öäü"
The body contains:
öäü
(This is different from what the OP reported, probably because I'm giving the command in an "UTF-8 environment")

-----
With the latest Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.7
thunderbird -compose "to='[e-mail]',subject='Test lønindberetning',body='Test lønkørsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt'"
Gives the following warning in the terminal window:
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird: line 164: [: too many arguments
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird: line 164: [: too many arguments

And giving an e-mail, where the subject contains:
Test lønindberetning

The body contains:
Test lønkørsel
-----
Trying
thunderbird -compose "to='[e-mail]',subject='Test%20lønindberetning',body='Test%20lønkørsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt'"

Gives the following warning in the terminal window:
(thunderbird-bin:18535): Gdk-WARNING **: gdk_property_get(): length value has wrapped in calculation (did you pass G_MAXLONG?)

And giving an e-mail, where the subject contains:
Test%20lønindberetning

The body contains:
Test%20lønkørsel
-----
Trying:
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird -remote "xfeDoCommand(composeMessage, to='[e-mail]',subject='Test lønindberetning',body='Test lønkørsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt')"

Gives the following warning in the terminal window:
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird: line 164: [: too many arguments
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird: line 164: [: too many arguments

In this case the subject contains:
Test lønindberetning

The body contains:
Test lønkørsel
-----
Trying:
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird -remote "xfeDoCommand(composeMessage, to='[e-mail]',subject='Test%20lønindberetning',body='Test%20lønkørsel',attachment='file:///home/ean/zzz%2Etxt')"

Still (surprisingly) gives the warning/error in the terminal window:
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird: line 164: [: too many arguments
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird: line 164: [: too many arguments

In this case the subject contains:
Test lønindberetning

The body contains:
Test lønkørsel
-----
Trying:
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird -compose "body=öäü"

Gives a warning in the terminal window:
(thunderbird-bin:18899): Gdk-WARNING **: gdk_property_get(): length value has wrapped in calculation (did you pass G_MAXLONG?)

The body contains:
öäü

The character encoding is:
Western (ISO-8859-1)
-----
Trying:
/usr/lib/thunderbird-1.0.7/thunderbird -compose mailto:?body=öäü

Gives a warning in the terminal window:
(thunderbird-bin:18832): Gdk-WARNING **: gdk_property_get(): length value has wrapped in calculation (did you pass G_MAXLONG?)

The body contains:
öäü

The character encoding is:
Western (ISO-8859-1)
-----

I hope I've given the information you need to investigate further, if not, please let me know and I'll try to give you additional information. 
(But I can't test it on Thunderbird 1.5b2 or Seamonkey for the reasons stated in the beginning and I'll not begin to make my own compilation...)

Comment 9

[Egon Andersen]

I've now had the chance to test SeaMonkey 1.0b on Linux FC3, and it behaves as Mozilla Suite.

Comment 10

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

*** Bug 329215 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 11

[Henrik Gemal]

related to bug 169388

Comment 12

[bugzilla.mozilla.org]

same on thunderbird 2.0.0.0

Bug also in attachment:

"""
thunderbird.exe -compose "subject=test,attachment='file://D:\testäöüß.png'
"""

The mail can't be send :(

Comment 13

[Magnus Melin [:mkmelin]]

No backslashes in urls, file://D:\testäöüß.png isn't a valid file:// url

Looks like bug 384160 though.