sending mail from Word to OWA: screenshots gone

[Amedee Van Gasse]

Environment: Exchange 2003, OWA, Outlook 2003, Word 2003.

We are having issues with pictures in emails.
A user writes a text in Word and adds screenshots.
He then sends the text, not as attachment but as message body.

In Outlook: all screenshots are visible.
In OWA: some screenshots are gone.

I already discovered a difference: when screenshots are added as
inline objects, they are visible in OWA. If they are in front of text
(or some other kind of floating layout), they are invisible.

Also when this email is forwarded from within OWA, other pictures
become invisible. However they are still there "somewhere" because
when I click the space where the picture was, there is a white
rectangle and its properties point to a png or jpg file.


We have a support contract with Microsoft, but before I jump trough
several hoops I would like to hear if someone else might know what is
going wrong.

 

[Ben M. Schorr, MVP]

I would guess it's a limitation of HTML rendering dealing with picture
alignment on a page. But that's just a guess. Apparently the HTML wants
the pictures to be inline rather than floating.


--
-Ben-
Ben M. Schorr, MVP
Roland Schorr & Tower
http://www.rolandschorr.com
http://www.officeforlawyers.com/outlook.htm

 

[Amedee Van Gasse]

I would guess it's a limitation of HTML rendering dealing with picture
alignment on a page. But that's just a guess. Apparently the HTML wants
the pictures to be inline rather than floating.

OK, that sounds reasonable.
Where would I find more information on the subject of HTML rendering
in OWA?

 

[Amedee Van Gasse]

OK, that sounds reasonable.
Where would I find more information on the subject of HTML rendering
in OWA?

*bump*

Where can I find information about HTML rendering in OWA?
Google can't find it.

 

[Brian Tillman]

Where can I find information about HTML rendering in OWA?
Google can't find it.

Since OWA uses whatever browser you're using for its rendering, see if you
can find something on the browser.

 

[Amedee Van Gasse]

Since OWA uses whatever browser you're using for its rendering, see if you
can find something on the browser.

That would be Internet Explorer 6.
Hmmm, interesting, will try with IE7, Firefox, Opera, Konqueror,
Galeon, Epiphany, and any other browser I can lay my hands on.
I'll update this topic with the results.

 

[Amedee Van Gasse]

Since OWA uses whatever browser you're using for its rendering, see if you
can find something on the browser.

I have discovered that it is not a browser issue.
I will give my evidence.

When I view the source in Outlook, I get the following HTML:


<td width=142 valign=top style='width:106.35pt;padding:0cm 5.4pt 0cm
5.4pt'>
<p class=MsoNormal><v:shapetype id="_x0000_t75"
coordsize="21600,21600"
o:spt="75" oreferrelative="t" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe"
filled="f"
stroked="f">
<v:stroke joinstyle="miter" />
<v:formulas>
<v:f eqn="if lineDrawn pixelLineWidth 0" />
<v:f eqn="sum @0 1 0" />
<v:f eqn="sum 0 0 @1" />
<v:f eqn="prod @2 1 2" />
<v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelWidth" />
<v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelHeight" />
<v:f eqn="sum @0 0 1" />
<v:f eqn="prod @6 1 2" />
<v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelWidth" />
<v:f eqn="sum @8 21600 0" />
<v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelHeight" />
<v:f eqn="sum @10 21600 0" />
<o:lock v:ext="edit" aspectratio="t" />
</v:shapetype><v:shape id="_x0000_s1026" type="#_x0000_t75"
style='position:absolute;
margin-left:1.2pt;margin-top:11.8pt;width:89.25pt;height:189pt;z-
index:-7'
wrapcoords="-182 0 -182 21538 21600 21538 21600 0 -182 0">
<v:imagedata src="cid:[email protected]" o:title=""
croptop="11958f"
cropbottom="6048f" />
<w:wrap type="tight"/>
</v:shape><span lang=NL-BE><o></o></span></p>
</td>


When I view the source in OWA, I get:


<td width=142 valign=top style='width:106.35pt;padding:0cm 5.4pt 0cm
5.4pt'>
<p class=MsoNormal>




















<span lang=NL-BE></span></p>
</td>


Notice the blank lines.
I know that <v:> is not a valid HTML tag. Conclusion: Outlook does
some kind of "magic" to be able to show invalid HTML.
OWA otoh only gives me (semi-)valid HTML. I checked in various
browsers, they all give me the same output.

The only logical conclusion is that this is a server-side rendering
issue.
So this is either a bug or a documented feature.
If it's a bug, where do I report it?
If it's a documented feature, where do I find info on the rendering
engine of OWA?

 

[Brian Tillman]

I have discovered that it is not a browser issue.
I will give my evidence. ....snip...
Notice the blank lines.
I know that <v:> is not a valid HTML tag.

No, but it could be a call to a java function.

Conclusion: Outlook does
some kind of "magic" to be able to show invalid HTML.
OWA otoh only gives me (semi-)valid HTML. I checked in various
browsers, they all give me the same output.

The only logical conclusion is that this is a server-side rendering
issue.

I'm not going to argue with you. Outlook is not involved with Outlook Web
Access in any way. Outlook Web Access works fine on PCs that don't have a
smidgen of any Office program on them. I will, however, concede it could be
a server-side issue (but not a server-side _rendering_ issue, since all the
rendering is cone client-side) and that Exchange isn't pushing out correct
code to the browser. Alternatively, it could be a probelm with the java
run-time you have installed on your PC. Then again, if you view your
messages using Word as your mail editor, maybe it's a Word problem spitting
out code that only it can read.

So this is either a bug or a documented feature.
If it's a bug, where do I report it?

I imagine you report it as you report any issue: call Microsoft support.

If it's a documented feature, where do I find info on the rendering
engine of OWA?

OWA has no rendering engine, since all rendering is done in the browser.
There is no client-side piece that gets installed and Outlook isn't
involved. In fact, in your very first post you said everything looked OK in
Outlook but not in OWA. Thus, Outlook doesn't have a problem and including
m.p.outlook and m.p.outlook.general in your crosspost is clearly counter
productive.

 

[Ben M. Schorr, MVP]

I'm going to have to agree with Brian on this one. The issue is either
browser or Exchange related in which case you'll probably need to follow-up
with either the IE or Exchange folks. Unfortunately analyzing HTML output
on the server-side is a bit outside my range of expertise.

You might try ms.public.exchange.clients (I think that's the full NG title)
where you may find some OWA experts.

--
-Ben-
Ben M. Schorr, MVP
Roland Schorr & Tower
http://www.rolandschorr.com
http://www.officeforlawyers.com/outlook.htm