-> [OL2007]: Not possible to add a table in HTML??? <-

[Steve JORDI]

Hi,

I have Outlook 2007 and was writing an HTML email and realized that I
was not able to add a table into the text.

How do you do such a very basic thing?
In the "Insert" ribbon, the "Table" button is always grayed out, no
matter what document format I use!

I have only Outlook 2007, not Office 2007. Is this related to Word?
I mean, wouldn't it be possible to add a stupid table without getting
the entire Office suite?

Thanks for any help.

Sincerely,
Steve JORDI

(Remove the K_I_L_LSPAM from my email address)

 

[Roady [MVP]]

That is indeed the case. If you hover above the Table option there is a
screen tip telling you the same.

FWIW; you've never been able to add a table to an email message without
having the same version of Word installed on the system in any version of
Outlook.

If you are using an html-editor to create tables you can inject the HTML
code directly via Attach File-> Insert as Text.

 

[Steve JORDI]

FWIW; you've never been able to add a table to an email message without

having the same version of Word installed on the system in any version of
Outlook.

Really? Amazing. This is such a basic feature even available in $14.95
sharewares! I'm stunned to say the least

If you are using an html-editor to create tables you can inject the HTML
code directly via Attach File-> Insert as Text.

Ok that did. Thanks for your help.


Sincerely,
Steve JORDI

(Remove the K_I_L_LSPAM from my email address)

 

[Steve JORDI]

Now I have a rendering effect.

In my table, I have the table with just one row and two cells.
The first cell has my business card in JPG and the second one
next to it has a background to fill out the rest of the table.
The borders and margins are all set to 0.

Now if I check the html file in IExplorer or FireFox, everything
is perfect.

If I insert this into an outlook HTML message, it has a small vertical
blank line between the two pictures... (left and right)

Is Outlook having problems rendering this?
Is it possible to remove that stupid thing?
I even have tried to set that background image as the table background
No success.

Here is the code:

<table width="100%" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"
background="bar.jpg" >
<tr>
<td><img src="sigImg.jpg" width="340" height="151" border="0" /></td>
<td><img src="bar.jpg" width="100%" height="151" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>

Thanks for any help

Sincerely,
Steve JORDI

(Remove the K_I_L_LSPAM from my email address)

 

[Roady [MVP]]

It appears so. I can repro your issue here.
The rendering is actually done by a Word stub and not Outlook. Therefore
reporting rendering issues would be more appropriate in the Word newsgroups
or directly to Microsoft via Product Support.

 

[Steve JORDI]

It appears so. I can repro your issue here.
The rendering is actually done by a Word stub and not Outlook. Therefore
reporting rendering issues would be more appropriate in the Word newsgroups
or directly to Microsoft via Product Support.

So guess that there is an embedded Word engine since I don't have Word
on my machine?



Sincerely,
Steve JORDI

(Remove the K_I_L_LSPAM from my email address)

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Correct, in Outlook 2007 there is no Word or Outlook email editor anymore
but only a single one which is based on Word and uses several Word
components like the HTML rendering engine. When you install a stand-alone
Outlook 2007, a Word stub is installed for the editor to work.



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[Steve JORDI]

It appears so. I can repro your issue here.
The rendering is actually done by a Word stub and not Outlook. Therefore
reporting rendering issues would be more appropriate in the Word newsgroups
or directly to Microsoft via Product Support.

Ha, there is a very funny thing though.
If you send an email with those two images next to each other, the
vertical line is shown in the compose window, but once sent, go to the
"Sent" folder and the preview pane correctly display the HTML without
that vertical line!
Now doubleclick it to open it and it's also correctly displayed.
Even better? With the message open, now select "Other actions" and
then "Edit message", here again, even in edit mode (just like when
compsing it), the HTML is correctly rendered!
Try to understand!
Just like the rendering machine between compose and display is not the
same! Amazing!

Sincerely,
Steve JORDI

(Remove the K_I_L_LSPAM from my email address)

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Yeah, it even gets weirder; press Forward and it shows correctly too. Click
the picture to select it and note that instead of having round selection
corners on the outside of the image, you now have square selection corners
inside of the image. Click the Format tab under Picture Tools in the Ribbon
and note that you have different picture editing tools.

I'll try to report it as well.



-----

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Can you post exact steps to reproduce for the 1st issue?

Your second issues I cannot reproduce and I use that feature quite some
times per day. What kind of formatting are you trying to clear when you use
it?



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[Steve JORDI]

Can you post exact steps to reproduce for the 1st issue?

Sure, make sure that you have an HTML formatted mail (received).
Select it, and click Reply.

This opens the editing window and you can see that the left part of
the received message shows a blue vertical line along the entire
content.

Normally, if you want to put a part of your answer between two
paragraphs, you would position your cursort just after the first
paragraph, and then click the "Unindent paragraph" button in the
"Basic text" icon group.

This is normally done to break that vertical blue line and make sure
that the recipient immediately knows which parts are his, and which
are yours.
This works perfectly in Outlook 2003 and before.
But not in 2007. It positions the cursor directly over the blue line
and then hides our first character when you type in text.
When sent, the recipient still has a full vertical line instead of
separated paragraphs.
In 2007, there is actually no way to break that vertical blue line as
it is the case in all other email clients.

Your second issues I cannot reproduce and I use that feature quite some
times per day. What kind of formatting are you trying to clear when you use
it?

Select an HTML formatted email you want to reply to.
Hit the reply button.
Make sure that you don't have any signature automatically inserted at
the top (actually, make sure that the reply edition window shows only
the prefixed text with the vertical blue line from the very top of the
window).
Select all by ctrl-a
Then click the "remove all formatting" button in the "Format Text"
ribbon part, in the "Font" icon group. It's the icon with "Aa" and an
eraser.
In my case it freezes Outlook



Sincerely,
Steve JORDI

(Remove the K_I_L_LSPAM from my email address)