How to Turn Off MIME and HTML in Email

From: "Prodigal" 
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 1999 15:05:57 -0500

From: Elizabeth McCoy 
>
> Microsoft emailers and browser/emailers are particularly 
> prone to sending stuff in MIME or HTML. There are at least 
> _two_ preference toggles you have to turn off to get plain
> text.

It's actually a little easier than that, with Outlook Express 
at least.

In the Options window, there's an option to reply to messages in 
the format that they were sent in, which takes care of it, IF 
you are replying to a plain text message.

If you're replying to a message in HTML or posting one that is 
not a reply, just click Format, and choose Plain Text. It's what 
I do, to make sure I don't violate the spirit of the list (or 
since this is about IN, would that be "the celestial of the 
list" instead?)

From: "Yeager, Alex" 
Date: Thu, 26 Oct 2000 16:49:02 -0400

FYI - it now appears that our server/firewall setup is
charitably attaching the HTML commands after
leaving my machine.  It might be worth a mention
in the "don't post if..." instructions (with the caveat
that it's still a Bad Thing To Post...)

As/if I get more info, I'll pass it along.

Alex Yeager

AOL 6.0

(Special thanks to Steve Manes for the original post, and 
to Beth McCoy for forwarding it.)

When communicating with Internet recipients who are not 
using an email program capable of selecting which MIME 
section to view, an AOL 6.0 user can turn off the HTML 
using the following steps:

Change your global email preferences (only needs to be done once):

   Go to Keyword: Preferences (or choose Preferences from the 
    Settings menu on the AOL 6.0 toolbar).

   Click on Font, Text, & Graphics Preferences.

   Click on the Reset button at the bottom of the resulting 
    window. Do not make any changes in the Font Preferences 
    area of the window.

   Click on the Save button.


Change a specific email to plain text (must be done for
every email):

   Compose and address the email as desired.

   Choose Select All from the Edit menu to highlight the 
    entire message.

   With the mouse arrow somewhere over the highlighted text, 
    click the Right mouse button, revealing a contextual 
    menu (AKA Right-Click).

   Choose Normal from the Text menu.

   Taking care not to make any further changes to the 
    message, send it.

Note that changing the text to normal will eliminate the 
"blue bar" quoted text indicator, but will not remove 
some HTML elements of the quoted text. The entire quoted 
section must be deleted (or simply not quoted in the first 
place), followed by the re-entry of the text quoted manually, 
prior to changing the text to normal. Changing the text to 
normal will also eliminate any styled text that would have 
been seen by AOL recipients of the message, which cannot be 
re-added. Testing also suggests that messages with hyperlinks 
cannot be converted to normal text, requiring the prior 
removal of the link.

(A caveat from Beth: This Doesn't Always Work.  Use this 
method at your own risk.)


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