41

How can I enable internet-style quoting in Outlook Web Access? I have found several guides on how to enable it in Outlook but not a single one on Outlook Web Access. We are running version 8.1.

I cannot access the server using Exchange/IMAP externally. This is providing significant problems for me now since I have to spend a lot of time editing long e-mails before sending replies.

7
  • You do not need IMAP access if you have Outlook, of course. You can add the Exchange server and user details into Outlook, if you have Outlook.
    – paradroid
    Oct 28, 2010 at 9:29
  • 1
    I forgot to mention that I'm accessing the server externally and the only way to do that is via OWA.
    – David Holm
    Oct 28, 2010 at 11:10
  • You do not have to use OWA to access Exchange externally. You only have to use it if Outlook is not available to you and you do not have to be on the same LAN. If you go to the Options area in OWA and go to About, you can get your mailbox server name.
    – paradroid
    Oct 28, 2010 at 19:02
  • 3
    Unbelievable. It's 2016 and you still can't reply inline using the Outlook Office356 web interface. I use Linux and am absolutely not going to install Windows or Outlook in Wine just to reply inline. Sep 2, 2016 at 6:29
  • 1
    Things continue to be ugly: outlook.uservoice.com/forums/284136-outlook-com/suggestions/… Jan 3, 2020 at 16:46

3 Answers 3

15

No, you cannot do email quoting in OWA. That being said, you can use Firefox with the It's All Text! add-on to open the text in a text editor and then add the quoting prefix there. From Fix Outlook Quoting Style:

  1. In OWA, choose to reply to a message. Horribly quoted message text appears.

  2. Use It’s All Text or some other similar tool to open message text in a reasonably smart editor.

  3. Filter entire message text through this script. E.g. in Vim type :%!path-to-script.rb, after making the script executable of course.

  4. Replace original mesage text with output of filter. If using It’s All Text, just type :wq.

  5. Presto! Correctly quoted message. You might have to move your sig, though.

That’s how to use it, now here’s the script:

#!/usr/bin/env ruby
# Fix outlook quoting. Inspired by perl original by Kevin D. Clark.
# This program is meant to be used as a text filter. It reads a plaintext
# outlook-formatted email and fixes the quoting to the "internet style",
# so that::
#
#   -----Original Message-----
#   [from-header]: Blah blah
#   [timestamp-header]: day month etc
#   [...]
#
#   message text
#
# or::
#
#   ___________________________
#   [from-header]: Blah blah
#   [timestamp-header]: day month etc
#   [...]
#
#   message text
#
# becomes::
#
#   On day month etc, Blah blah wrote:
#   > message text
#
# It's not meant to alter the contents of other peoples' messages, just to
# filter the topmost message so that when you start replying, you get a nice
# basis to start from.
require 'date'
require 'pp'
 
message = ARGF.read
# split into two parts at the first reply delimiter
# match group so leaves the delim in the array,
# this gets stripped away in the FieldRegex if's else clause
msgparts = message.split(/(---*[\w\s]+---*|______*)/)
# first bit is what we've written so far
mymsg = msgparts.slice!(0)
# rest is the quoted message
theirmsg = msgparts.join
# this regex separates message header field name from field content
FieldRegex = /^\s*(.+?):\s*(.+)$/
from = nil
date = nil
theirbody = []
theirmsg.lines do |line|
  if !from || !date
    if FieldRegex =~ line
      parts = line.scan(FieldRegex)
      if !from
        from = parts.first.last
      elsif !date
        begin
          DateTime.parse(parts.first.last)
          date = parts.first.last
        rescue ArgumentError
          # not a parseable date.. let's just fail
          date = " "
        end
      end
    else
      # ignore non-field, this strips extra message delims for example
    end
  else
    theirbody << line.gsub(/^/, "> ").gsub(/> >/, ">>")
  end
end
 
puts mymsg
puts "On #{date}, #{from} wrote:\n"
puts theirbody.join("")
1
  • 1
    It seems that the "It's All Text!" Firefox extension does not exist any more (or that the link is broken).
    – bli
    May 8, 2020 at 15:24
1

Here's what I did --

Copy the part of the message you want to quote, scroll back up to your reply, and then click the "quote" button (under "message" toolbar), then paste it in.

Outlook web formatting toolbar with "quote" button highlighted

The pasted message appears with a default style of a grey bar to the left; in order to insert replies inside the quoted text, just put the cursor there and hit enter or return a few times to break out of the quoting and put in your inline replies:

Email message showing quoted parts interspersed with unquoted inline replies in Outlook 365 OWA web app; text is quotes from Bhagavad-Gita Chapter 2

This is on Outlook Web App hosted on outlook.office365.com; not sure how to check which version, but I believe it's a current version as of this writing (Aug 2023). Hope that is helpful. Wish it was more built-in, but at least it is not too hard and doesn't require any additional software or plugins.

1
  • This is actually the best answer, as it's actual quoting in an actual reply, even though you can't set up quoting by default. Mar 11 at 10:30
-1

Assuming that you are using Linux, here are a couple of alternative email clients which you could try:

Gnome: Evolution - This definitely works, but connecting to Exchnage through OWA.

KDE: Kontact - It appears that this works with older Exchange servers.

1
  • Thank you for the answer but I really would like to be able to do this from OWA instead of using client software as I usually access it using a browser.
    – David Holm
    Nov 2, 2010 at 8:54

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .