Okay, so I just loaded Office 2010 at work. I'm a long time user of Mozilla Thunderbird, but I decided to give Outlook 2010 a whirl.
Everything was going just fine until I wanted to add an image to my signature. The image I inserted into the signature is a very simple PNG file. However, for some crazy reason, Outlook wants to blow it up to a larger size than it really is. Of course, this distorts the image and it looks terrible.
I can't for the life of me understand why Outlook can't simply let me insert the image without trying to resize it in order to make it larger.
Has anyone else heard of this problem? If I can't get this fixed, then it's a deal breaker for me and I'll just go back to Thunderbird. I would like to give Outlook a chance, so please help!
Fire away with any questions.
Signature headaches | Outlook 2010 Forum
Hi Rebel,
Can you insert the signature image into this discussion so i can test it out?
Hi Rebel,
You could also try this:
Open up a new email message. Go to signatures and insert your signature that has the image in question. Then click on the image and it will get highlighted. You'll be able to resize the image. Resize the image to the size that you like. Then right click on the image and go to copy. Then go back to Signatures, go the the image in question, highlight it, delete it and then right click and paste. It should paste the new resized image into your signature. Go ahead and save and you should be good to go.
Here is quick video for a visual.
Well I had already tried something similar to that, but instead of using the signatures option in the ribbon I went to the File menu.
Your method worked to size down the image worked. Thank you for the help. However, it still degrades the sharpness a bit. The image of the image is text, so it's fairly noticeable. I tried using the sharpening feature by right-clicking on the image, but it just doesn't quite do the trick. It might be because resizing it in Outlook can't exactly match the original resolution (353x85). Of course, there's no way for me to check that in Outlook because it defines the image size in terms of height and width instead of pixels. I don't understand why MS thought it made sense to only definte the image size by the height and width. I have never seen that before in other applications. What's more, the height and width the image covers depends on what your screen's resolution is. A 353x85 image will take up more space on a 1024x768 screen than a 1280x1024 screen.
I'll play around with Outlook for a while, but this is a bit disappointing.
I understand the disappointment but the issue of text images being displayed on various resolutions can be a problem for most. Resizing the image in a professional. Editor might be your best bet. We could also help.
Outlook 2010 has a lot to offer. Continue to explore and in time you'll wonder how you ever managed without it.
Thank you for using the forums and kindly spread the word.
Best,
Well, I ran into another annoying issue.
At work I am part of a small support group and often send email under two other different "identities" or "personas". This functionality is inherent in Thunderbird, and I can set most mail options for each of these identities independently. For example, if I wanted to use a different signature when sending mail as identity #1 than identity #2, that is very easy to do. I just set my preferences up accordingly, and then when I compose a messsage I can select the identity I want to use from a dropdown list.
Zimbra, which is the web email client we use at work and the IMAP server, also has this functionality through creating what are called "personas". However, the level of customization you can achieve with each "persona" isn't quite as robust as what you can do in Thunderbird with identities.
Anyway, to get this functionality in Outlook 2010 I had to use a Zimbra add-in that made my personas available in Outlook. So far, so good, since the multiple personas (identities) I have set up in Zimbra are the same ones that I have set up in Thunderbird. But I was disappointed to discover that there is apparently no setting in Outlook 2010 where I can configure a list of email addresses to automatically Bcc when sending mail as these other identities.
For example, my identity #2 is a support email address which actually has 3 other people on the group. We often like to use this identity to send email to customers so that their From line shows the name of the support group. Thunderbird also allows us to automatically Bcc the other members of the group when you send an email under the group name. So, when I send an email under the group name or reply to an email that was sent to the group address, it automatically adds the other members of the group as Bcc's so they can see the correspondence, but to the outside world it appears that the communication is being done by a single unit.
Outlook 2010 does not offer this feature, as far as I can tell. If I wanted to switch to Outlook, then I would have to manually add the Bcc's myself every time I sent email under the support group name, or at the very least add the support group address to the Bcc line. I know that doesn't seem like a big deal, but it is inconvenient nonetheless.
The main reason I wanted to consider a switch to Outlook is because of better integration with our company calendars (Zimbra). Thunderbird's "Lightning" add-on reads the calendars ok, but doesn't work well for interacting with them (adding or modifying events, accepting/declining meeting requests). So anytime I need to interact with a calendar, I have to do it through the Zimbra web client. While this is annoying, I send and reply to emails much more often than I interact with the calendars, and I have determined - at least for me - that Outlook does not add any extra convenience or features that I feel are significant for my uses which I do not already have in Thunderbird.
Going back to the image insertion issue, I discovered that the problem wasn't exclusive to the signature. I tested inserting images into email messages, and it almost always wanted to blow them up to a larger size. I use screen captures from time to time embedded in my emails, and it would be annoying to have to resize them every time and lose image quality in the process. The only time Outlook wouldn't try to make the image larger is when the image was already a higher resolution. I just can't make any sense of it. Perhaps there will be a patch that fixes it sometime down the line. I just don't think there's any excuse for the way the Outlook is working with images right now. I've never had any problems like that in Thunderbird.
The calendar interface in Outlook 2010 is definitely superior to what I have Thunderbird 3.1 + Lightning, but other than that I have yet to find anywhere else where Outlook surpasses Thunderbird.
I think I'm going to play around with it a little more in the upcoming week before I render my final decision, but the outlook for Outlook doesn't look very promising at this point.
This is also what I miss most in Outlook. I need identities feature like Thunderbird has and couldn't find how to setup this in Outlook 2010
Hi Serhiy,
I am not familiar with thunderbird. Could you tell me exactly what you're trying to accomplish? I suspect that you may be able to resolve your identity issue by creating an additional profile which you could switch back and forth to and from. You also have the ability to create multiple accounts (email) and multiple signatures and bases on the email account you're using you can designate the proper email signature. Let us know and well see if we can't get this sorted out for you.
Thank you,,
Hi,
Actually, the previous author described it quite well.
From my side I can add only few things. I'm Ukrainian and write messages to Ukrainian users as well as to English and Russian. For Ukrainians use I send mails and they receive it from Сергій Кузнєцов (my@email), and to English users I send mails as Serhiy Kuznyetsov, to Russian Users I send my name in Russian.
Apart of this I have several mail addresses, so for every my email account in Thunderbird (that is different email address and different mailbox) I have three "identities", Ukrainian, English and Russian.
With those identities I can change the "name from", the "mail address from", the signature "from", even the SMTP server and a lot of other things. And all of this identities just for one mail account. For other mail accounts I have other "identities". For now I have altogether about 8 identities, which are generally the "From Name" in Ukrainian, Russian and English for every "From Address". And when I create a message, I have all those identities in drop-down list where I can easily chose it. I don't like when my English recipient receives my "From Name" in Russian and vise versa.
Few times I started with Outlook 2010 and the fact, that I couldn't find this feature turned me back to TB. I tried something with profiles, created in my address book another contact with the same address but different name and tried to send from this address, but the message received was without "From Name", only with "From Address".
I you will help me with this, I will be very thankful.
Regards, Serhiy
Thank you for the detailed description. I understand the exact issue now. Il do some testing and exploring and post here. I may create a new thread from your posting. If so, I'll post at both places.
Serhiy,
this is what i've resolved.
Using Outlook 2010 i created 4 email accounts. 1 is an exchange account and the other 3 are pop accounts (yahoo, live, etc).
For each email account I created a different name, John Doe for my exchange account, Tom Brady for my Yahoo account, Jane Doe for my Live account.
I then went to Signatures and I created a separate signature for each email account.
When i create a new email, i can no choose the from email address and the from email address updates my from name and it updates the signature that i created for that particular email account.
Let me know if this is what you're trying to accomplish and i'll either create a video or put together a step by step with instructions.
Outlook 2010 Professional
Hello,
thank you for your efforts and time spent to help me with this matter. I appreciate it very much.
Actually, what you suggested is not what I try to reach with Outlook 2010.
You have different from name for different accounts (email address), but I need different 'from name' for the same account (the same email address)
Of course, if I can get different signatures for the same account, this would be a bonus, but for now it is not so important for me as to be able to send with different 'from name' but from the same email address (account).
Serhiy
Hi Serhiy,
You should be able to change the from name and use the same email address. There is a new feature in Outlook 2010 that will allow you to do this. It will also also you to change the email address on the fly as well. You will need to create some new contacts (in your contact folder) with the new name but it certainly does work.
Here is a screen shot. Let me know if this does it?
Thank you, damon,
but this doesn't work, I already have tried it before and sent mails from one my address to another using different contact with the new name but the same email address, and the point is that by using the feature you've suggested, the messages comes without the 'from name' and have only 'from address'.
Regards, Serhiy
I think what you want to do with the other "from" name can be accomplished by creating a new Outlook "Profile" for that email address. Do this from the Mail section in Control Panel. You can use the same email address, just give it a different display name in the Your Name field. Tell Outlook which profile to use as default when it opens. Then when you click on the From... field down-arrow in a new message, choose that other profile as Sender.
Also, you can copy the default message form in Outlook and personalize it. You can pre-include your bcc names (I tried it, and it works). From the Home Tab, click New Items, More Items, Choose Form. Click on the "message" item and click Open. After you personalize it (show bcc and add bcc names; show From field, etc.). From the Developer Tab, choose Publish, Publish Form As... and save it to your Personal Forms Library and give it a name.
To send a new message with your custom form, go again to New Items, More Items, Choose Form and open your form from the Personal Forms Library. To make this easier, you could tell a certain folder in Outlook to always use this form for messages. It's in the Properties tab for that folder as "When posting to this folder use: _______.
Do a search on custom forms in Outlook for more info. Hope this helps.
Thank you for your time.
With the profiles Microsoft site says on http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-help/outlook-e-mail-profiles-e...
You cannot switch between profiles while Outlook is running. To change profiles, you must exit Outlook, and then select the appropriate profile when you restart Outlook.
The new message form is just the same as the new message window. I added screenshot. New Message Form
And I can not achieve the desired result. I even added the three personal contacts with different names, and choosed the desired name using the From button and sent the mail to myself and I recieved the mail just from address, without the name displayed.
It is important, that when I send my mails to English people they can read my name, because not all of them read Russian. Also vise versa. Other things will not be respectful for them.
If the programmers read this, please, look how it is made in thunderbird, easy to use and easy to set up. I would be happy to see this in Outlook. I also attached the screenshot of thunderbird. Thunderbird new message screenshot with the list of identities
Hi, Sergiy. Okay, instead of a Profile, have you tried creating a new Outlook email 'account' for the email address but with a different display name (the "Your Name" field)? This is from File, Info, Account Information, Add Account (or Account Settings, Email, New). I tried this, chose the new account as Sender with the From... button, and it came to me with the new name displayed (along with the email address). I don't know about adding in Cyrillic text to this, but my husband has 3 email addresses and can send emails from any of them this way, with his name displayed differently for each one. Good luck!
Thank you again, we are on the way :-)
now the problem comes that it creates in Outlook new folder structure for this account, but since I have already an account with this email address, I would like to use the existing folders. The account is IMAP. Is it possible to merge somehow those folders into one structure?
I have 4 email address and don't want to have at least 8 folder structures.
Regards, Serhiy
I have two thoughts on this (although I don’t know why Outlook created what you call a new folder structure):
1. Change the default folder the mail goes into.
Go to File, Info/Account Information, click on the Account Settings button and choose Account Settings... At the bottom of the pane is a button “Change Folder.†Are your newly created accounts going into the same folder as your main account? If not, change them there.
2. You can create a “Rule†to have incoming mail from other accounts be moved upon receipt into the main Inbox folder.
Rules are great. You can tell Outlook to flag or mark messages a certain way, move them, delete mail from a certain sender :-) - almost anything. Go to File, Info/Account Information, click on the Manage Rules & Alerts button and choose New Rule... It’s easy to figure out.
At the bottom of the pane, choose “Start from a blank rule†and “Apply rule on messages I receive.†In the Rules Wizard pane, “Step 1: Select condition(s) - check “through the specified account.†Click on the link below to choose the account. Follow the wizard and choose the other conditions you want to apply (move, flag, mark as unread, etc. etc.) Be sure to turn the Rule on when you are finished.
I realize this doesn’t do anything about the folders (?), but mail handled with a Rule goes immediately to the location you choose: there is no delay.
Thank you, Alice, that you have more patience then me with this :-)
First, with the folder structures I mean the imap folder structures (with Inbox, Sent, Drafts etc) on the left pane of the Outlook. On the screenshot you can see them, two as you can see are the English and Ukrainian accounts for the same email address, and you see, they are two structures, I need only one. 
The button you suggested to use I don't have, otherwise that would be really good. The reason for this I think is that I use IMAP accounts. I have one POP account and the button is there for this POP account.
With the rules I'm a bit hesitant to go, because those two structures are actually the one on a server because it is the same email address just with the different From name, and with the suggestion to use rules and move the messages I fear to end up with a loop, because I when I copy something to the inbox it will again appear in both accounts since it is actually the same one account. And I don't like to download the same messages twice, I'm on wireless and pay for traffic.
It is pity that I can not find Identities in Outlook. I have them in Gmail, Round Cube, Horde, Thunderbird...
Outlook 2010 email signature problem. I have created a signature and have chosen it to be my default signature on all new messages and replies ! Remains attached to all emails until I shut down my computer for the day. Once I open up outlook again next day signature is no longer associated with ANY new or reply messages! HELP!!!
Step 0: Create a default signature in Outlook 2010 for your Profile. Close Outlook.
Step 1: Go to Start >> Run >> %appdata%\microsoft\signatures
Step2: Edit the corresponding .htm file. Delete everything in it and add any HTML you want for your signature including image height, width and alt data. (I used Dreamweaver to create my HTML file.)
Step 3: Save file and open Outlook and check your email.