There is not much you have to do. Let's look at a test message, sent by an
Outlook 2000 client through a 5.5 IMS. I'll type the body of the message
interspersed with my comments, marked by "***" And anyone out there who has
a better grasp on this than I can feel free to correct me.
--- begin included message ---
***First, the usual headers, most of which users can't see and don't care
about. I've snipped a lot of them.
Subject: off we go
Date: Thu, 31 Oct 2002 14:45:44 -0500
MIME-Version: 1.0
X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2653.19)
***The next line is where the MIME content is defined for the recipient's
mailer to read:
Content-Type: multipart/alternative;
boundary="----_=_NextPart_001_01C28116.1A26A8C0"
X-RazorChecked: Yes
Status: RO
X-Status:
X-Keywords:
X-UID: 1
***The following line is put in to taunt people who don't use MUAs that
can't read MIME. Unfortunately it will sometimes show up regardless.
This message is in MIME format. Since your mail reader does not understand
this format, some or all of this message may not be legible.
***Following is the part with the "plain text". A MIME-aware MUA that is not
displaying HTML for whatever reason will display just this section.
------_=_NextPart_001_01C28116.1A26A8C0
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="iso-8859-1"
now is the time for all good men
--
be - MOS
Do not underestimate the power of the Force.
***And here is the HTML-encoded section of the message. A MIME-aware MUA
that displays HTML will present this.
------_=_NextPart_001_01C28116.1A26A8C0
Content-Type: text/html;
charset="iso-8859-1"
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<TITLE></TITLE>
<META content="MSHTML 5.50.4134.600" name=GENERATOR></HEAD>
<BODY><FONT face=Tahoma color=#800000 size=2>now is the time for all good
men</FONT><BR><BR>
<P><FONT size=2>--<BR>be - MOS<BR><BR><BR><BR>Do not underestimate the power
of
the Force.<BR></FONT></P>
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</BODY></HTML>
------_=_NextPart_001_01C28116.1A26A8C0--
--- end included message ---
So that's how Outlook does it, and on the whole it works out pretty well.
The only real problem is that some people, many of them 'way smarter than
either of us, use mailreaders that will display all of the above, or even
will display the HTML code without prettying it up. So those folks will get
a lot of garbage on their screens. The only saving grace is that by now they
are used to it.
If I were sending mail blasts I'd do them in plain text. But then again, I'd
make the message so persuasive that people would buy my goods or services
even _before_ they had opened the message. It would just be that good.
--
be - MOS
A committee is a life form with six or more legs and no brain.
-- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough For Love"
> -----Original Message-----
> From: RBHATIA [mailto:RBHATIA@;AIIM.ORG]
> Sent: Thursday, October 31, 2002 1:44 PM
> To: Exchange Discussions
> Subject: RE: Mail blasts
>
>
> I would like to use the first method - mail goes out as MIME type
> multipart/alternative. Is there anything special I must do
> when drafting the
> mail in Outlook 2000 ?
> The mail is an HTML message that is sent in the body of the message as
> inline text and not as an attachment. What am I to do in
> order to send it as
> a MIME type multipart/alternive ?
