Gmail hides URL addresses in mail notifications

[Bernhard]

This might sound a bit silly but it's actually a real issue. I have all my launchpad e-mail forwarded to a Gmail address and the Gmail system always hides the URL addresses of bugs (seemingly because it thinks it's a quotation). Now my question: is it possible to configure mail notification so that URLs show up in the beginning of a mail notification (bugzilla is like this)? Or in any other way that doesn't confuse Gmail?

I will attach two screenshots to demonstrate the problem.

[Bernhard (b.a.koenig)]

Btw, the reason Gmail thinks it's a citation (or rather a signature) is because of the line that starts with "--", and the URL after that.

[Björn Tillenius (bjornt)]

No, there isn't any configuration option for this, and I don't think we'll add one, since configuration options add complexity.

I'm not marking this bug as Won't Fix, though, since we might want to rethink how we construct the e-mail notifications.

[Bernhard (b.a.koenig)]

You wouldn't need to add a configuration option for it, just make sure that gmail doesn't hide the launchpad link. For example, removing the "--" might help or check how GNOME bug tracker does it.

[Bernhard (b.a.koenig)]

Anyway, thanks for looking at it!

[Deryck Hodge (deryck)]

We don't need the to file this against One Hundred Paper Cuts, too. This request is outside the scope of that project.

[Graham Binns (gmb)]

Retargeting this to the Null project to reduce spam for the Hundred Paper Cuts guys.

[Bernhard (b.a.koenig)]

@Deryck, Graham: Launchpad is part of Ubuntu and this is definitely a small easily fixable issue which would improve user experience. Exactly what papercuts is. Could you please explain why it's a papercut issue instead of just saying that "it's not".

[Deryck Hodge (deryck)]

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 7:37 AM, Bernhard<email address hidden> wrote:
> @Deryck, Graham: Launchpad is part of Ubuntu and this is definitely a
> small easily fixable issue which would improve user experience. Exactly
> what papercuts is. Could you please explain why it's a papercut issue
> instead of just saying that "it's not".
>

One Hundred Paper Cuts is about small usability fixes in the Ubuntu *Desktop*.

Cheers,
deryck

[Graham Binns (gmb)]

2009/8/21 Deryck Hodge <email address hidden>:
> On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 7:37 AM, Bernhard<email address hidden> wrote:
>> @Deryck, Graham: Launchpad is part of Ubuntu and this is definitely a
>> small easily fixable issue which would improve user experience. Exactly
>> what papercuts is. Could you please explain why it's a papercut issue
>> instead of just saying that "it's not".
>>
>
> One Hundred Paper Cuts is about small usability fixes in the Ubuntu
> *Desktop*.

Also, for the record, Launchpad isn't a part of Ubuntu. It's developed
in large part by Canonical, but the two projects are separate and have
separate initiatives.

--
Graham Binns | PGP Key: EC66FA7D

[Bernhard (b.a.koenig)]

An average user might definitely encounter this on his desktop when using it since Ubuntu encourages to use Launchpad. But anyway, I'll leave this interpretation up to you. What I don't understand is why this is not fixed, it would save you a mouse-click each time you open a bug-mail! And that's quite a lot over time for Gmail users. And (almost) everybody has Gmail.

[Vish (vish)]

@Bernhard:
Thank you for bringing this bug to our attention. However, a paper cut should be a small usability issue, in the default Ubuntu 9.10 install, that affects many people and is quick and easy to fix. So this bug can't be addressed as part of this project.

For further information about papercuts criteria, please read https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PaperCut.
Don't worry though, this bug has been marked as "Invalid" only in the papercuts project.

On a side note:
Gmail is only the 3rd largest email provider , so not everybody has it... ;)
it would be only at best 30% of the population. :)

[Deryck Hodge (deryck)]

Hi, Bernhard.

No one said we would not fix this. It's marked low priority because we have higher priority issues at the moment. There are also the questions of how exactly to address your concerns. But mostly, it's just that we can't get to this issue right now. It's certainly a good point to raise, thank you!

Also, Launchpad is open source now, see https://dev.launchpad.net/. If you would like to work up a branch that addresses this bug, we will, of course, be happy to take a look at it. Ask on IRC or the launchpad-dev mailing list if you need help in taking on this bug.

Cheers,
deryck

[Bernhard (b.a.koenig)]

OK, I will think about opening my own branch. But I think all that needs to be done would be to remove the "--" from the notifications. I will experiment a little to find out more about what Gmail considers a signature and post my findings here.

[Bernhard (b.a.koenig)]

Correction: "When Gmail receives an email with the same subject line and sender as a previous email, it automatically considers it part of the same 'Conversation' and groups them together. Then, any text following the end of the second email which exactly matches text from a previous email, it considers 'Quoted' and hides behind a 'show quoted text' link, even if you weren't actually quoting it from the previous email."

So the only way to get around that would be to put the URL at the top of the mail notifications, that's actually how GNOME Bugzilla does it. Maybe they had something like this in mind. :)