Having set up my tasty new Mini, with Tiger, I am seeing something irksome and new. When I open up a fair amount of incoming email, the text is terribly narrow. I can barely read the type, it’s so thin. Not a font I recognize either, but then again it may just be because it is so narrow.
I’ve poked around the Mail Preferences and don’t find anything that allows for adjusting the view of a font used to write one’s incoming email. OTOH I’ve never seen something like this before.
Anyone else experienced this with Tiger? I am also using a larger HD 23" Cinema Display monitor, though I doubt this is the cause of the altered font.
Assuming you’re using Mail.app, the Font & Colors tab in preferences should adjust the viewing font for plain text messages. The Message Font will change the standard font used for both composing and viewing mail (Rich Text mail will of course still appear in whatever font the sender specified). If the Used Fixed Width… option is checked, it may also be worth unchecking it, or choosing a different fixed width font, to see if that’s the problem
Is it possible you could post a screenshot so as we can see what you’re seeing?
Oswald, I had gone into Mail Controls- and when I clicked or unclicked the Fixed Width option, the email I was fussing over… “jumped”, but the font I was looking at did not alter. Pity, that.
I’ll post a screenshot as soon as I figure out how.
Yes I am using the native Mac.mail program for my emails.
What fonts and sizes do you currently have set for your ‘Message Font’ and ‘Plain Text Font’? Did you try changing the font and size to see what happens? If it helps the default font for ‘Message font’ is Helvetica. As you’re using a large monitor I assume you’ll probably have a high resolution, which means you may have to up the font size above 12 as well… Does messing with any of these settings affect what you’re seeing?
I just realised that images can’t be posted on the SDMB, so I guess that’s out - do you have anywhere you could host an image?
It might just be a matter of closing Mail and trashing your prefs - might involve you having to set your mail account up again, but that’s not a huge chore…
Where is the mail coming from? I have seen attributes inherited from incoming mail servers. Specifically, I work with Notes a lot and have found some very funky formatting coming through from the Domino server to my home mail (I use notes at work and Mail at home)
It’s a long shot, but… try hitting command-[ that often changes my mac mail from formatted text to plain text; after that, maybe you’ll be able to get the font to change. It may be the same thing you’re doing that makes your text “jump,” though.
Hi, I’m back. Interestingly enough, though it didn’t appear to alter mail already recieved, I just got another email from one of the offending senders.
His incoming text is now my chosen font from those menus- Comic Sans 12. ( me, I love my comic sans, I do )
Perhaps I had to shut down the computer and restart? Or, perhaps it only makes that adjustment on NEW incoming mail and not on any mail already read, that was read with the old preferences?
Seem to have solved the problem, though. Still- someone please tell me how to do a screenshot? I use PhotoBucket and so have a place to park an image for Dopers to look at.
And, thank you all so much for the help with this !!
Use the Grab application in Applications/Utilities, or one of the following fantastic keyboard shortcuts (all saved to the Desktop in PNG format):
command+shift+3: Full screenshot
command+shift+4: Crosshair to allow selection of screenshot area
command+shift+4, then spacebar: Camera to capture specific screen object
I just tried that, Oswald. It would allow me to target an area of this thread, or of an MS Hotmail Mailbox Page, but would not allow me to target an area of an email. I use Mac’s own mail program, too. Weird. Yet another Tiger inconsistency?
No crosshairs appeared and I got that little dull “thump” that in MacSpeak means, " Sorry kiddo".
I think there may be some sort of misunderstanding here. Are you using command-shift-4 to get the crosshairs? That should capture information directly from the screen, without any concern for what program or what sort of data is in the part of the screen you select. (One provisio: the capture occurs beneath your monitor’s color settings, so will not pick up changes that occur at that level. That shouldn’t be an issue here.)
When you take a screenshot, the computer makes a “click” sound like a camera shutter. Were you interpreting that as a “thump?”
Cool. Well, half-cool. I got the cross-hairs and heard the cute little “camera snap” sound.
But um… where do I make said screenshot go, so I can save it as an image and then upload it to PhotoBucket so one and all can see the bizarre fonts I’ve been looking at?
If you took the screenshot with the shortcut keys it should have saved a PNG image file to your desktop. If you used Grab you’ll need to first save the image (it will save as a TIFF). If PhotoBucket doesn’t accept these image formats, you can convert them to another format by opening them up in Preview and using the Save As menu option.
