I tried to duplicate your issue, but I cannot. If I do bullets, after pressing Enter key one more time, the bullets stop, as desired. And the button to remove text styling was not desired to remove the font and size as defined on the drop-down list, as that isn't 'styling.' Styling includes font size changes, font color, bold and italics (and maybe a few I'm not thinking of...) I know this doesn't resolve your concern, but I find using the HTMLedit addon very helpful on occasion to view or tweak the HTML

These problems don't happen all the time. Most of the time the bullets work fine and as expected. But sometimes something gets it confused and it is very frustrating when it is impossible to fix it. Regarding formatting, the Format menu option lists Font, Size, Text Style (italic, bold, etc.), Paragraph, List, etc. All of that is "Format" and who doesn't think of ALL those things as text styles? With HTML formatting, all those things are controlled by the "style" tag. So I guess what the editor needs is an option: "Remove all text formatting" because currently that is not possible. Thanks for the suggestion for an HTML edit add-on but frankly nobody should have to know HTML to compose an email. Plus I won't install any add-on that says it will: "Have full, unrestricted access to Thunderbird, and your computer".

Thanks.

I will agree that HTML isn't straightforward. The feature to remove styling gives the feedback that all is removed, but the font that is removed is only for whatever was highlighted (I just did some checking), in which it defaults. However, this a markup language and TB must interact with HTML received elsewhere. For example, I have found that my font in replying to messages, and sometimes the font in receiving messages, is not what I had carefully specified. I did notice that Thunderbird 101 has more settings on composition and how to handle HTML and plain text.

I'm perfectly comfortable with HTML, write it every day and also write code to generate HTML and CSS, but I shouldn't have to do know any of that to edit an email. And my wife shouldn't have to know anything about HTML to be able to produce a flawless email message -- that is its job. So I'm disappointed that Thunderbird doesn't have a better editor. I only have version 91 (the latest release) so who knows when version 101 will be released. I hope some improvements come along soon.

A little off topic, but I cut text I want to clear formatting from and then paste without formatting Ctrl+ Shift+V

I have agitated for years about the editor, the developers honestly can't see anything wrong with the 1990s editor. I wanted it replaced with something new that did not rely on Mozilla flaky editor component. That did not fly. But you are welcome to request enhancement in bugzilla. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/home

Otherwise there is a user experience mailing list that you might want to raise your issues on. https://thunderbird.topicbox.com/groups/ux

I think getting more participation on these mailing lists is a priority as developers really are hard to convince other do not like what exists and most of the discussion is an echo chamber with the same old participants. You can almost predict who will say what.

David, and Matt,

Thank you both for your feedback. Nice to know I'm not totally alone or missing something. I do use the cut and paste without formatting method but even then I still find myself struggling with some editor issue like those every other day or so. Frustrating. It is hard to imagine that the developers don't encounter these things themselves if they use their own product. I'll look at the user experience board and I'll post something on bugzilla, but as a programmer myself I know they will want a concrete example that they can repeat and these are things that are not easy to create, I'm not sure I could because the causes are not obvious, plus I don't really want to post a real message that I'm having trouble with, much less have time to stop and post it somewhere when I really need to get the message sent without the formatting problems.

Thanks again.

re :2. Sometimes the bullet-list won't let you stop the list, hitting Enter on the last blank bullet doesn't always end the list and just keeps adding bullets.

Two 'Enters' clears the list, but as you selected the bullet icon to switch list on - you can also select again to switch if off. In the same way you select 'Bold' to switch it on and select again to switch it off

The quick method is to type the list, highlight it and select the bullet list option, then it does not need switching off. In the same way you can highlight a single word and select bold and it only makes that word bold.

If the received email contains html coding, then when you click on 'Reply', the new Write window opens and displays the received message which will include all of the html coding applied in the original email.

The extent of control you will have when adding your response to the email, will largely depend upon what the original sender chose to be in the html coding or indeed where it was created. For example, MSWord programs will have an extraneous amount of html code that controls the email and it's contents. A reply is adding to the original email and therefore the original html may effect what you want to write.

If this presents a real problem due to the sender htnl coding there are some options: 1. use plain text in all the email - hold down Shift key and click on 'Reply'.

2. Click on Reply right click in compose area and click on 'Select All' or use Ctrl+A Select 'Cut' and then use right click > 'Paste with formatting' This includes the original email as plain text, but still allows you to use html in your response. It also means you can insert additional html if required.

re : "Remove all text formatting" because currently that is not possible. Selecting all the text results in the following: I find 'Remove Text Styling' removes only the text formatting from my response eg: my signature or anything I've typed. such as the font face, colour of font, bold, italic etc. But it is not removing anything from the 'style' section of copied over html code.

However, in the copied email section, I do have control over specific highlighted areas in that you can eg: change colour of text, size of font, bold, italic etc or delete modify etc Or I use the options 1 or 2 as mentioned previously.

Yes, I agree with you that if you highlight everything and select 'Remove Text Styling' then you would expect html to be preserved but all 'style' sections to be removed as well allowing you to completely redo the html. Although, you can achieve the same by using alternative methods.

Thanks but as I said in my first message, I have used the Thunderbird editor for many years. I know how to use it. What I am complaining about is that sometimes it DOESN'T work as expected or how it is supposed to. Such as when I start a bullet or numbered list and then it won't escape when I enter two carriage returns at a new blank bullet line and it just creates bullet line after bullet line with no text. And sometimes highlighting some text and choosing "Format | Remove All Text Styles" does change the font and size and sometimes it won't.

Without any option to view the raw text of a message being edited (as we can on messages we receive, by choosing "More | View Source") there is no way to see what is triggering or something that may be responsible for the poor behavior. If the developers used their product every day like I do, perhaps they would notice these issues and believe the reports of problems.

Do you use any addon extensions or themes that are not Thunderbird default themes? If you use some addons, please let us know.

You would need to run Thunderbird in Safe Mode to see if the problems still occur.

I have never had any issues which you describe. A double Enter has always cleared the bullet. Or any of the alternate methods I mentioned always works. Remove All Text Styles has always removed it.

However and this is a big however..... If replying to an email, then html in original email may influence what is typed, so you would need to confirm you are only taking about new Write mail or whether this only occurs when you are replying. Thunderbird does not remove all the style set html which has been copied over when you click on 'Reply'.

I've never installed any extensions or themes, all those things are the defaults. Frankly I've never noticed a pattern so I don't know if it only happens when replying to a message. I create and/or reply to dozens of messages a day. All I know is that it happens and is very frustrating when it does. I'll try to keep track of that in the future.

If you can identify the cause, at least there is something to ask a developer to fix. With these sorts of things the body fixing the issue must be able to replicate it at will to test their fix, or even start looking for some defect in the over one million lines of code that make up Thunderbird that handles that exact document structure.