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Outlook Tips & Techniques: Preventing Plaintext-Message Signature Lines from Running Together

Answers to your Microsoft Outlook questions

I'm running Microsoft Office Outlook 2003, and I always compose my messages in plain-text format. When I compose a message, my signature looks fine:

My Name
Position, Unit
Region
Company
Phone: 333.333.3333
Fax: 333.333.3333
Web: http://web.address.com

But recipients see the signature with the second, third, and fourth lines run together:

My Name
Position, Unit Region Company
Phone: 333.333.3333
Fax: 333.333.3333
Web: http://web.address.com

How can I prevent my signature lines from running together?

Add three spaces to the beginning of each line of your signature. That should prevent Outlook's automatic plain-text line reformatting from touching those lines on recipients' machines. In an effort to make plain- text messages more readable, Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2002 by default reformat plain-text messages by removing line breaks that aren't clearly intended as paragraph breaks. Adding three spaces to the beginning of a line tells Outlook not to apply the reformatting algorithm to that line.

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