275968 - Message composition: Implement feature/UI for editing HTML source (window/inline tab/view+button)

Status: NEW

(Thunderbird :: Message Compose Window, enhancement)

Description

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

Enhancement: Would be nice to have HTML edit window (like, dare I say, in
Outlook Express)

Comment 1

[Jo Hermans]

Reporter, what do you mean ? Ofcourse, there's a HTML edit window, but by
default you're in plain text mode. To change this, go to 'Account Settings',
then to 'Composition'.

Comment 2

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

I wasn't clear. The message compose window in OE offers three tabs, one to edit
the message, one to edit the HTML of the message, one to "preview" the HTML
message without being able to edit. I think the third tab is pretty much
useless, but being able to switch between "normal" tab and "HTML" tab would be nice.

Comment 3

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

Attachment: View of Outlook Express compose window

Comment 4

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 229117 ***

Comment 5

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

This does not look like a duplicate of bug 229117, which isn't very clear but appears to requests tabs for editing plain text part vs. HTML part of the same message. This bug 275968 requests a "View/Edit Source" mode for messages composed in HTML (edit only the HTML part, from which plain-text part will be automatically created). The other bug is a can of worms; this bug here is much more realistic, and much more useful!

A working implementation (using two tabs) can be found in ThunderHTMLedit Addon.

Comment 6

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

Before marking a bug as NEW, please check if it's a duplicate...

Comment 7

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

This is not really a duplicate of bug 143593, since that reads:
Add/Implement UI to edit HTML source while composing mail (minimal fix: add context menu command "Edit HTML", then reuse existing feature "Insert HTML")

No, I don't want to use the "Insert HTML" window.

Frankly I don't see how reshuffling bugs adds any value here.

Comment 9

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

Just be very clear here:
Using the "Insert HTML" window as HTML editor (as suggested in bug 143593) is not the solution we want. It offers no syntax highlighting and no search facility and compared to ThunderHTMLedit the formatting is pretty poor.

ThunderHTMLedit also works on plaintext messages which is an essential feature to diagnose problems for the experienced user. And one would expect a user to be experienced when digging around with the HTML.

Given that there is a working add-on to compensate for a TB deficiency, like there is LookOut to fix bug 77811, "Manually sort folders" to fix bug 193314, "Dictionary for recipient" to fix bug 1020181 or "Cardbook" (which I haven't tried) to replace the bug-ridden TB address book, I don't think we're in a big rush to implement anything here.

If anything, it's better to keep this bug open (instead of bug 143593) since it suggests a much more useful solution (HTML view in a tab) as detailed in comment #2.

Comment 10

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

Just to be very clear here:

Using the "Insert HTML" window as HTML editor (as suggested in bug 143593) may not be the perfect and ultimate solution that we want, for all the reasons mentioned by Jörg; but imho having *any* direct, inbuilt way of editing HTML source is better than having no out-of-the-box way at all. Add-ons should not become stop-gaps for missing features in the core. Add-ons don't come with maintenance promises, so they are unreliable and can stop functioning/disappear at any time. Not every user will be willing to install addons for all the shortcomings in core. It's more than doubtful if or when anyone will find the time to implement the nice full-fledged two-tabs variant seen in the addon into TB core. Meaning we'll deprive our users of this basic feature for an even longer time.

Having an HTML tab in plaintext compositions might be useful for very advanced users; for anyone else I believe it will be quite confusing because it does not make sense to edit the HTML source of plain text, which seems quite contradictive and points to the problem that we're using a reduced HTML editor to produce our paintext.

If anything, imo it's better to keep both this bug and bug 143593 open, as two variants of implementation for this painfully missing feature:
Bug 143593: Minimal fix, *much* easier hence faster to implement (until we get the full fix)
This bug 275968: Maximal fix, much harder to implement (unlikely to happen any time soon).

Comment 11

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

The "Insert HTML" dialogue can be used now as HTML viewing and manipulation facility, I wouldn't call it an "editor" due to a lack of editor-typical features. No work is required to use it. IMHO, promoting it as Thunderbird's HTML "editor" would be wrong.

Can we please stop the discussion now. Bug 143593 hasn't seen any action in fifteen years.

Comment 12

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

(In reply to Jorg K (GMT+1) from comment #11)
> The "Insert HTML" dialogue can be used now as HTML viewing and manipulation
> facility,

Technically yes, but practically no. Nobody who wants to "View HTML Source" will search for that in "Insert" main menu. It's just not discoverable. 

> I wouldn't call it an "editor" due to a lack of editor-typical
> features. No work is required to use it.

And yet it's de facto useless for viewing HTML source if it's not discoverable.
If made discoverable (e.g. by an unobtrusive context menu on composition body), it will be a poor editor, but at least it will allow editing anyway, at all.

> IMHO, promoting it as Thunderbird's
> HTML "editor" would be wrong.

Leaving users without *any* practical/discoverable way of viewing HTML source *out-of-the-box*, without the need for addons, is also wrong. I'm not promoting it as an ideal editor, I want to tweak what we have a bit so that it becomes more useful. We both now that the chances of implementing your nice addon into core in the near future are slim. Or maybe you want to volunteer to do that?

> Can we please stop the discussion now. Bug 143593 hasn't seen any action in
> fifteen years.

Haha, that's funny. Your bug here hasn't seen any action in twelve years, as it was wrongly duped against another bug until I un-duped it now, and you never even said anything about that wrong status...

So Jörg thinks it's better to wait for miracles at an unknown point of time in the future when somebody volunteers to integrate Jörg's addon into core. Meanwhile everyone who wants to view the source of their HTML message may please find, download and install the addon or discover an undiscoverable related feature in the product. Fair enough. Everybody is entitled to their own opinions. I've laid out mine, and I stand by it, because until proven otherwise I believe it's in the better interest of our users to offer them something rather than nothing in the product. Premature end of discussion doesn't solve any problems. I rest my case.