[Tickets #10487] Re: HTML/Text Signature

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Ticket URL: http://bugs.horde.org/ticket/10487
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  Ticket             | 10487
  Updated By         | Michael Slusarz <slusarz at horde.org>
  Summary            | HTML/Text Signature
  Queue              | IMP
  Version            | 5.0.10
  Type               | Enhancement
  State              | Feedback
  Priority           | 1. Low
  Milestone          | 5.1
  Patch              |
-Owners             |
+Owners             | Horde Developers, Michael Slusarz
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Michael Slusarz <slusarz at horde.org> (2011-12-02 14:57) wrote:

First off, see Ticket #10798.  This is *exactly* one of the issues I  
mentioned below.  And it is an example of something that cannot be  
fixed reliably.  Pretty much cements that signatures need to be moved  
out of the compose window.  (Or, at the least, it means you have to  
choose between multiple sigs and having the signature in the compose  
window.  This is really not a close case - multiple sigs is way more  
important and useful to the largest number of users.)

I don't really care what other MUA's do.  Especially desktop clients -  
they can do more funky things in terms of protecting blocks of text in  
their compose window box.  We don't have that option - javascript  
event handling of textboxes is not foolproof (and I neither want to  
write nor maintain this kind of code).  And we don't have direct  
control over the HTML input because that is handled internally by  
fckeditor.  This is simply a limitation of the browser features  
available to us.  The easiest, cleanest, and fool-proof solution is to  
remove all signatures from the compose window.

STILL not buying the "user may forget" what they put into their  
signature argument.  I have yet to hear a credible argument about  
*why* you would want to change a signature.  Signatures are meant to  
contain contact information.  If you are regularly adding/altering  
your signature, THIS IS NOT A SIGNATURE - you instead want some sort  
of template functionality.

I don't necessarily think the principle of least surprise applies  
here.  We already perform modifications on outgoing text (e.g.  
converting to multipart/related; trailer hook), so the message that is  
being sent is not the same as the message the user sees in the compose  
window anyway.  As previously mentioned, a user can not possibly be  
"surprised" by text that they created.

And in many practical uses, people don't want to see these signatures.  
  Some signatures may be very long (especially in professional firms  
that want to put all sort of disclaimer information in there).  We  
don't have a giant compose entry window - adding signature information  
is a waste of space that is better used for the important part of the  
e-mail - the actual content.

In real word usage, a signature would be comparable to letterhead.  I  
can't think of anybody that would cross out information in the  
letterhead to update it.  If the letterhead information is incorrect,  
you would use a different piece of paper.