471498 - Forwarding email with attachment sends all previous recipients with the attachment

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Thunderbird :: General, defect)

Description

[kurt rosenfeld]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.0.5) Gecko/2008120122 Firefox/3.0.5 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Build Identifier: Thunderbird version 2.0.0.20pre (20081227)

When forwarding an email with an attachment the whole of the email in question is shown in the attachments window. This includes the list or lists of previous mail addresses who have received the email.

The attachments window should only have the attachment applicable to the email being forwarded, not the recipeint list and text of the email itself.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.
2.
3.
Actual Results:  
The attachment window shows an attachment but that attachment includes all email addresses and text of the message being forwarded as well as the attachment in the orifi==ginal message.

Expected Results:  
The attachments window should only have the attachment applicable to the email being forwarded, not the recipient list and text of the email itself.
That information should be displayed in the email body enabling the sender to delete any information he does not wish to forward with the attachment.

It is at times vital that a forwarded email does not show the names and addresses of previous recipients of the email. Also the incoming email text may be confidential and should not be forwarded.

Comment 1

[Aaron Lawrence]

I think you're saying you want the "Forward" function to only forward the attachment(s), not the rest of the email. Is that correct?

However, Thunderbird (and every other email client that I know of) normally works the way you are complaining about - forwarding applies to the whole email.

You can simply delete the text of the email manually.

We can turn this into an enhancement request to have a "Forward attachments only". That has some merit.

Comment 2

[kurt rosenfeld]

(In reply to comment #1)
> I think you're saying you want the "Forward" function to only forward the
> attachment(s), not the rest of the email. Is that correct?
> 
> However, Thunderbird (and every other email client that I know of) normally
> works the way you are complaining about - forwarding applies to the whole
> email.
> 
> You can simply delete the text of the email manually.
> 
> We can turn this into an enhancement request to have a "Forward attachments
> only". That has some merit.

Somehow you have not understood the problem. By the way I am a computer consultant and well versed in the other main email programs. Those have a different behavior to Thunderbird as they will display the text and show the attachment name (rather then the name of the email containing the attachment)

Lets try again.
1. When forwarding an email Thunderbird does not quote the text of the email in the mail window. Instead the email to be forwarded is only seen as a header in the attachment window.
2. It is possible to display this text in the mail window by clicking on Options/Quote Message. Accordingly the total contents of the email are displayed including the addresses of people who have already received the email.

3. It is possible to edit that content and remove - add anything required. However, the attachment is till shown in the attachment window. That attachment still contains all the text and addresses which might have been removed.
If that attachment is deleted then any real attachment such as pictures etc. are lost and not forwarded with the email.


I hope this is clearer for you but will gladly help with further explanations if required.

Kurt

Comment 3

[Aaron Lawrence]

That is standard/designed behaviour when forwarding as an attachment. The complete messages is sent as an attachment and cannot be edited. When you quote the message you're making a separate copy of the text into your new email.

If you switch to forwarding inline (Menu: Message - forward as - inline, or set the default with Options - Composition - Forward - Inline) then you will get an editable copy of the text and only the original attachments. You can then remove what you like.

Comment 4

[kurt rosenfeld]

(In reply to comment #3)
> That is standard/designed behaviour when forwarding as an attachment. The
> complete messages is sent as an attachment and cannot be edited. When you quote
> the message you're making a separate copy of the text into your new email.
> 
> If you switch to forwarding inline (Menu: Message - forward as - inline, or set
> the default with Options - Composition - Forward - Inline) then you will get an
> editable copy of the text and only the original attachments. You can then
> remove what you like.

I have cured the problem as you suggested. However, I found the following sentence in your on line help.

"Thunderbird 3.0 will forward inline by default now rather than sending messages as attachments"

That would solve the problem. Why is that not done for the Shredder version?

Alos the Forwrd icon could be allowed to let the user choose when he clicks.

You previous suggestion to have a 'Forwrd attachments only' option is a good idea as it will save a lot of editing out of addresses and unwanted text.

Comment 5

[Aaron Lawrence]

I'm not a Mozilla developer... but isn't Shredder the candidate for TB 3.0? So I don't really know what you mean, as they are basically the same thing. Perhaps that change hasnt been done yet. Where does the help say that?

You can submit a new enhancement bug for the forward attachments only, if you feel it's worthwhile. i could not find an existing bug about this.