Re: HTML, MUAs, and listservers

[John Denker <jsd@MONMOUTH.COM>]

At 12:09 PM 10/11/00 -0500, Maurice Barnhill wrote:
>    1.  Netscape apparently will not format HTML unless there is a header
> on the EMail specifying HTML coding, even though the character set is in
> ascii.  The messages that work have a header "Content-Type: text/html;
> charset=us-ascii".  This header is missing, or says "text/plain," on
> messages where the commands are displayed instead of being executed.

Right.  The same applies to practically any MUA (mail user agent), not just
the Netscape mailer.

>    2.  Netscape sends this header only when using the HTML editor to
> write the body of the message.

Again, the same applies to practically any MUA, not just Netscape.

>    3.  The list server never sends the relevant header.

That's true, alas.  The phys-l listserver is quite a bit behind the state
of the art.  In contrast, listservers based on qmail
  http://www.qmail.org/
handle HTML and other MIME-types routinely.

>    4.  Worse, the Netscape HTML editor does not allow the writer to
> insert his/her own HTML codes simply by typing them in.  Moreover, there
> is no obvious way to do so using the editor's toolbar.

Typeset the expressions using your favorite word-processor, then
cut-and-paste them into the mailer.