916817 - Modify labels for incoming mail character encoding in the advanced Display options to reflect "fallback" after bug 846221 introduced it for browser prefs

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Thunderbird :: Preferences, defect)

Description

[rsx11m]

The term "default character encoding" for incoming messages isn't intuitive as it's actually specifying a "fallback character encoding" if the message itself doesn't specify that encoding in its MIME headers. SeaMonkey bug 895751 and bug 902131 changed this for the browser and mail/news preference panes, respectively. I'll file another bug covering the MailNews Core part for the Folder Properties dialog.

The dialog for the Display > Advanced options dialog is a bit tricky as it combines both settings for incoming and outgoing messages. An easy fix would be to simple reword "Set the default character encoding for sending and receiving mail" to "Set the default/fallback character encoding for sending and receiving mail" and leave the rest unchanged. The other option would be to expand the labels in front of the charset selectors:

Set the character encoding for sending and receiving mail
  Default for Outgoing Mail:
  Fallback for Incoming Mail:

A third option would be to perform a redesign of that section per bug 373590 to split off the outgoing part into the Composition tab. That would allow to rephrase the remaining labels to be specific enough for the incoming mail fallback charset selection.

Comment 1

[rsx11m]

The other question is whether or not (and how/where) to include the expanded description for the Incoming Mail selection "Used for legacy content that does not declare its encoding."

Comment 2

[:aceman]

Suyash, is this something you would want to try? From reading the description there does not seem to be any backend/pref changes needed, just some changing of labels or reshuffling XUL elements.

rsx11m, thanks for thinking of TB :)

Comment 3

[rsx11m]

:-D I'll take care of bug 916823 for the Folder Properties dialog myself as I had a half-done SeaMonkey patch already when I figured that it needs to cover Thunderbird as well.

Comment 4

[Magnus Melin [:mkmelin]]

I do wonder if the fallback encoding is really used by anyone for anything useful? The number of messages it applies to must be absolutely miniscule.

Comment 5

[rsx11m]

Mostly automated messages, such as in mailing lists from older systems.

Comment 6

[Magnus Melin [:mkmelin]]

Bug 1671880 will resolve this.