Outlook '07 Takes a step backwards

[ner0]

Well, just today I upgraded my laptop to outlook '07, have had the desktop running it for weeks now with no real problems.

However, for work, I've had to design a series of eMailshots (like html newsletters really, sent to previous customers), all of these I just hammered up in notepad mixing XHTML and CSS, have sent this many times previously with outlook 2003 with no real problems, though I come to insert the file in '07, and hmm, looks very strange.

So after looking around in the settings I reached the point where I just had to google it, and came across many articles stating that MS have decided to remove a great deal of it's CSS support, in favour of their Microsoft Word HTML engine, or something along those lines.

Why would Microsoft choose to step backwards? or are they simply trying to secure their monopoly by forcing people to design anything HTML/Rich Content based using Microsoft Word/Outlook, out of fear that using anything else will render the majority of their reader-base unreachable.

I'm completely confused at this, as Outlook 2003 seemed to handle emails without any problems, and now I need to use a whole 'nother machine to send these newsletters, which means losing all settings, and just general inconveniences.

Gutted!

[Josh]

You're having all kinds of problems lol. I'm not sure why they would step backwards...That's quite weird imho :\

[Sylo-X-]

Yeah it makes no since why they would want to take a step back like that. Im pretty sure if not now before long you'll be able to download a patch from somewhere(besides microsoft) that enables outlook to support CSS...Someone is bound to write one

[Josh]

It would be an interesting patch to write and dispatch :\

[Alexander]

There is a very good reason why the problem occurs, Microsoft in all their wisdom decided to switch HTML rendering in Outlook to their Word engine, by doing this they have taken a step back to very early versions of Outlook, and you are asking why... there is an ethical debate you must take when considering this... HTML Rich e-mail does have the advantage of making its content look better for the end user, allowing you to brand your message more effectively, and also in usability studies HTML rich email has proven more likely to result in sales but here im going to be the devils advocate and congratulate Microsoft in effectively crippling half of the HTML rendering capacity through email...

Firstly, HTML rich e-mail is effectively spyware... now i know what your thinking, im exaggerating things, well see what you think when you read the following... the second you open that html rich e-mail... the HTML requests the images and CSS files and JavaScripts from the spam mailers server (have you ever had an email with all the images, etc attached?) by doing this spam companies can determine your email address, your country of origin, your IP address, statistics on your computer such as your OS, the program your using to read the email, your browser, your resolution, and much more (believe me JavaScript is a very very powerful way to get statistics on your computer, even though it cant be used to hack you) ... the crazy thing is that most people dont even think about that, which is why spam is so heavy these days... HTML e-mail is most convincingly the biggest cause of spam in history and what it can pick up from you (apart from phishing) is basically scarey.

secondly HTML rich e-mail is dangerous (seriously)... have anyone here heard of viruses being embedded in images? activeX? exploits? malicious scripting? ... Yea? well guess what, much of it stems from HTML rich e-mails, not just from attachments... now im not saying everyone is a crook or out to attack you but exploits appear on the internet on an almost daily basis and HTML Rich email is a great way to embed a virus in an image, or mabie a worm in a script... heck one single vbscript in an HTML rich message could effectively start deleting files... or installing spyware on your PC... no im not an extremist here, im just going on proof of concepts and flaws in HTML rich mail which has existed since the 1990's

Basically if we didnt have HTML rich email we wouldnt have half the amount of viruses, exploits, and spam we do now... if you ask me... it may be boring but plaintext is what E-Mail was designed for and keeping HTML emails is the worst thing we can do... many web developers agree with me on this issue.

PS: HTML rich e-mail often renders in internet explorer... security? whatever <img src=\'http://www.killanet.net/forum3/public/s ... >/blum.gif\' class=\'bbc_emoticon\' alt=\':P\' />

[ner0]

I see what you're saying, Alex, all fair points.

Though many -web- designers may agree, those who design HTML/CSS based emails for legitimate purposes (myself included) are pretty much scewed.

Disabling Javascript etc is fine, I encourage it, infact. Though what exactly is dangerous about CSS positioning elements, and why do they choose to disable attributes such as float?

There will always be points for and against, and while email was designed for plain text, one could say that TV was designed for Black and White, things evolve, wouldn't it be more of a step forward to fix security holes rather than move back to the comfort zone?

Anyway, what's done is done.. thanks for the comments&#33;