Merging a return-separated text string for plain text

Support, Tips and Tricks for Proof Group's fmSpark "merge anything" utility for FileMaker Pro.
Posts: 30
Joined: Tue Oct 06, 2009 1:51 pm
Location: Austin, Texas
PostPosted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 2:19 pm
Hello!

Each user designs their own email signature block something like:

Joe User
Marketing Director
Big Company, Inc.
512/123-4567 x.109
www.bigcoinc.com
"Compelling Marketing Promise Here!"

This is in a single field in my solution in FileMaker that I have referenced in a calculation in the fmSpark User table so that it is available for merges, along with other user-specific data. This merges just fine and displays the returns in fmSpark as above. NOTE: we are just talking simple plain text email here, not using an HTML template. We actually have an HTML version of the same signature block with tags that works just fine.

Problem is on some, but not all email clients, the returns in the plain text signature block disappear. For example, the returns are there in Entourage 2004, but my client on Outlook (unknown version) does not see them. She sees:

Joe User Marketing Director Big Company, Inc. 512/123-4567 x.109 www.bigcoinc.com "Compelling Marketing Promise Here!"

I have dug as deep as I can in fmSpark and I end up at the MergeExpressions custom function as the likely source of the issue. But it is beyond me at this time to attempt to troubleshoot this function. Plus it's difficult for me to test since my email client is not exhibiting the behavior. We can work around the issue by constructing email signatures from individual pieces of data in the templates for now. But would be nice to find a fix as my client would rather be able to customize the email signatures for each user in a single text field, which allows for much more flexibility and freedom of expression for each of the users.

Thanks for your thoughts and suggestions!
Hedrich Michaelsen
Austin TX
512-458-2099

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