InfoPath Dev

Hi all,

i'm working for a couple of months now on InfoPath browser enabled forms.

I never used email submit connection but I'm working on a project that requires this functionality.

I noticed a strange layout when I received forms by mail when they were sent from the server although it works fine when they're sent by InfoPath 2007 client.

Here is (on the left) how the form (Microsoft's sample) is rendered in the browser and on the right the mail when it is read with Outlook 2003.

The result is a bit better when opened with outlook 2007 but still not perfect.

I suspect the table layout with merged cells to cause this behaviour but I would want to keep this layout as I have many forms to work with.

Did anyone ever encountered this issue and knows how to deal with it ? Or does anyone knows what's microsoft's point of view regarding this issue ?

 

Thanks

I found what is causing this rendering bug in emails sent from the server.

When you insert a layout table with the following column sizes : 255px 20px 255px here is what is inserted in the xsl :

<table>
<colgroup>
<col style="WIDTH: 255px" /><col style="WIDTH: 20px" /><col style="WIDTH: 255px" />
</colgroup>
<tbody>
<tr><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr>
</tbody>
</table>

Now when the view is sent by mail, here is what I receive :

<table>
<colgroup><col style="WIDTH: 255px" /><col style="WIDTH: 20px" /><col style="WIDTH: 255px" /></colgroup>
<tbody>
<tr><td width="20"></td><td width="255"></td><td></td></tr>
</tbody>
</table>

A workaround is to manually edit the xsl file and use the style attribute of <td> to set the width :

<tbody>
<tr><td style="WIDTH: 255px"></td><td style="WIDTH: 20px"></td><td style="WIDTH: 255px"></td></tr>
</tbody>

I still don't understand why Forms services implementation has this behaviour, if someone has an idea or another workaround that don't require to edit the xsl please let me know.

I solved this problem in an other way: I made sure, that no width was set to 100%. Nor on table width, and especially nor on field width, 'cause even if you set the column widt to an exact width, the field width overrides it.

I am also encountering with this problem and still not solve. No width fields were set 100%. It's only the repeating table that cannot set width and it stretch form very long width.

Hi,
 
I also faced this kind of problem while implementing this feature in my project.The work around i had done is i just placed the Url of the form in the Outlook email body.So user can open the form by just clicking on the Url.

So, maybe this is a bug from M$. My project manager prefer displaying the form in email to replacing with the URL.

Hope to here everybody.

Thanks

I saw which piece of code from MOSS is causing the problem and I understand it pretty well now.

When there are attributes in <tr> it is shifting column width values. Ex: <tr height="20px">, columns width values will be shifted to the left by 1, by 2 when there are two attributes, etc...

When designing your form, ensure row height is set to 'auto' to avoid this layout bug. Other attributes, related to style for exemple, will cause the problem too. Track these attributes in your view's xsl and design your form accordingly.

You have to take care of merged cells too. Colspan doesn't seem to be handled in the width attribute's computing. The only workaround I have for merged cells involves the xsl editing I showed in my second post.

I'm pretty confident that it will be corrected by M$, but I don't know when.

Well, I now can fix the length of textbox, but the date picker is still not solve.

Funny that although I set Alignment of textbox is Center but display in email still left because of class "xdTextBox" has "text-align:left" property.

There is a hotfix available that solves my problem, probably others too. It should be included in public patches soon.

Has anyone found the Hotfix for this problem? I went through the available hotfixes at msdn, but none of them fixed the problem.

 

Help is much appreciated.

I also have this problem, but it is not consistent. Most of my users see the form just fine, while others, including myself, have a skewed view of the form; it is extremely wide for us.

It doesn't seem to be specific to any version of outlook, as my users and the mix of people who have the problem are split between 2003 and 2007.

 

I believe there is a setting in Outlook that can fix this. I saw one of my users click on something by accident that fixed the view, but he wasn't sure what he did.

Has anyone figure out a resolution to this problem. I am having the same problem.

well,for all the controls in your form, open properties page,goto size tab,select auto for height and 100% for width.And publish your form again,to the form library..

Nope, it still does that same thing if I use a web enabled form and email to Outlook 2007. If I just send the form out from Infopath, it comes into Outlook with no problems.

I am also facing the same problem when my Infopath form is send to Outlook 2003 as an email. I use Layout table all the time and seems to be the problem when you split or merge the cells.