Smart-Forward and Smart-Reply

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Smart-Forward and Smart-Reply

Love the iPhone but we have noticed in our business that it simply doesn't support all the ActiveSync protocols. The most notable one is Smart-Forward and Smart-Reply.

The net result of this is (1) we risk losing formatting when forwarding emails (particularly "embedded" or attached emails, which get mixed in to the main email body on forward); (2) large attachments need to be forwarded in full locally on the handset rather than on the server side (as with BlackBerrys and other devices), resulting in huge data bills when roaming, long sending times and also difficulty when in spotty reception areas; and (3) header information is not maintained as with Outlook.

We have been submitting feedback to Apple from the outset, with no resolution in sight or acknowledgement that this is even a problem. It also does not appear to be fixed in the forthcoming iOS 4.1.

Does anyone know of a workaround to get Smart-Forward or Smart-Reply working on a iOS device? Everyone in our company has been forced back to their BlackBerrys for the time being as IT have said the iPhones are too unreliable for business email and that Apple are doing nothing to rectify the issue. It's a shame as we like the devices for everything save for their rubbish business email support.

Thanks

MBP

Posted on Aug 18, 2010 3:24 AM

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Answer 1

Aug 19, 2010 1:09 AM in response to klmac

You are not alone. - The missing of SmartReply/SmartForward is the biggest disadvantage of iOS for business users.

All mobile devices with ActiveSync use the SmartReply protocol, so the mail never really leaves Exchange and mails are replied/forwarded in seconds. The devices only send their answer texts to the server and the server compiles the reply. Apple left out this protocol and uses the standard SendMail protocol. This means: to forward an attachment you have to download it to the iPhone/iPad and upload it again. Since mobile devices are used mobile it becomes nearly impossible to forward a bigger attachment. Worst, the iPhone only allows 9 MB to download. So forwarding a file bigger than 9 MB is just not possible.
We as a record company need to forward big attachments (MP3s, TIFs…) from our mobile devices all the time and none of the other mobile OS’s is as easy to use as the iPhone OS. We have tried Android, WebOS, etc. But when it is getting hectic and you have to rely on the hard- & software to do its job the iPhone is the only accepted device (except BB and WM that have no entertainment factor which is important too because this let the employee stay connected to the team even in the free time. 🙂

The reply behavior of the iPhone Mail.app is unfortunately similar to most of the IMAP mailers:
The source code of a HTML mail is modified when replying and codes which Outlook has put there for reason are deleted or transformed so that the original mail comes back with a different layout.
You can test it by yourself, if you have Outlook (2007/2010). Send yourself a HTML e-mail with two lines and reply it once from iPhone and once from Outlook, OWA or any ActiveSync device except iPhone OS. Then compare the source codes. You'll see the difference. The most obvious effect is the double line space in Outlook now. You sure know that the HTML code for "new line" is "br". But when you hit Enter in Outlook it generates a special Office paragraph "o:p" instead of a standard line break "br".
As long as all users communicate with Outlook it doesn't matter, because "o:p" are shown as "new line". But as soon as the conversation leaves Outlook/OWA/ActiveSync (e.g. iPhone) and comes back "o:p" has become "p" which means that all lines are now double spaced.

SmartReply would solve all this. Forwarding a 50 MB is done in no time and all Office codes are being kept.

Our workaround so far: We have set up our own Exchange server and installed the Exchange add-on “OWA for PDA” ( http://www.leederbyshire.com/OWA-PDA.asp). We redesigned it to be iPhone friendly, use HTML and some other things. We now have a fast and reliable webmailer for the iPhone’s Safari which also allows access to (really) everything that is supported by the Ex210 Outlook Web Access. 99% of all features like flagging of emails are possible with the add-on.
We are currently working on an offline Web App based on jQTouch, so that the webmailer becomes similar to the (well designed) Mail.app in iOS and stores as many information as possible for offline access.
We are currently looking for partners to return some of the cost of developing all this. So if you or anyone is interested in a cooperation please contact me.

Sebastian

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Answer 2

klmac Author

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Aug 19, 2010 3:19 AM in response to Sebastian Wolter

I'm glad to see I am not the only one! I am surprised more businesses are not complaining about this. We send large and multiple attachments all the time (PDFs, TIFFs etc) and the iPhone is a disaster for this compared to our incredibly efficient (but otherwise v dull...) BlackBerrys.

For a while we were able to use DocsToGo for iPhone, which did have its own email conduit and did implement smartreply and smartforward for all attachments, but since iOS now supports opening attachments in apps, DocsToGo have removed this in their current version.

Your workaround sounds interesting. The offices that I work at however don't allow us to access from OWA on the handset - also we use RSA SecurID as an additional layer, so opening OWA sessions are a pain.

I was hoping that it might be possible to edit a .plist file or a mobileconfig set up to "switch on" or enable Smart-Forward, as people did with WebOS before it supported the protocol.

Can't understand why Apple are being so resistant to this. It's a critical feature of business email. The only benefit is to the mobile carrier who ***** cash for all the wasted bandwidth.

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Answer 3

Aug 19, 2010 3:34 AM in response to klmac

If only Apple would allow developers to sell a richer ActiveSync e-mail client for iOS. There are several for Android, all work well using SmartReply/SmartForward by nature. At least one of them would have been ported if Apple would accept another AS e-mail client beside Mail.app, I bet.

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Answer 4

klmac Author

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Aug 19, 2010 3:39 AM in response to Sebastian Wolter

Again - precisely my thought pattern.

I have used Nitrodesk on Android and, whilst a bit ugly, it gets the job done admirably. This is a major problem of Apple's walled garden approach to app approval. It fails to provide the functionality itself and then stops developers from providing it also.

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Answer 5

klmac Author

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Jan 26, 2011 3:30 PM in response to klmac

Any word on whether iOS 4.3 fixes this? Or any apps that can do this? I can't find anything on this.

I am despairing a little that we're on iOS 4.2 and basic email functionality is being ignored in deference to font changes and similar....!

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Answer 6

klmac Author

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Mar 6, 2011 7:28 AM in response to klmac

I see that iOS 4.3 GM is out, with the main update available from 11 March.

Does anyone know if the GM or the final release makes any improvements to Apple's mail app to fix these problems? I have looked around and can't see anything on mail fixes - just pointless GUI surface updates. It's as if Apple couldn't care less about its Enterprise customers.

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Answer 7

klmac Author

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Mar 18, 2011 6:01 AM in response to klmac

In answer to my own question for those who may be interested, it would appear 4.3 does nothing to improve this issue.

Apple continues to ignore its enterprise customers....

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Answer 8

klmac Author

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Jun 7, 2011 3:56 PM in response to klmac

Anyone know if iOS 5 corrects this?

There seem to be a whole slew of mail-related improvements on show....😕

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Answer 9

Sep 13, 2012 8:43 AM in response to Sebastian Wolter

Does anyone have a solution to this smart forward / smart reply issue? It's still a huge headache to forward attachments from the iPhone and responding from an iPhone breaks all formatting in Outlook email messages.

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Answer 10

klmac Author

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Sep 13, 2012 8:52 AM in response to joshdcurry

Sadly not and iOS6 does nothing to improve it.

As a workaround you will have to use a 3rd party app such as Moxier Mail or iKonic, which will make this work. Not ideal but it's a start. I have used both and they are generally fine.

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Answer 11

AFDeLuca

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4 points

May 1, 2013 9:40 PM in response to klmac

So disapointed - I was fooling with a friend's iPhone 5 and really liked it. As I was up for a new phone, I was definitely planning on getting the iPhone 5. But, when I asked him about Smart-forwarding, he didnt know if it worked or not. We tried to forward an email with an attachment and had to download the entire attachment to his phone before forwarding the email.

I can believe we are all the way up to iOS 6 and Apple still hasnt fixed this issue. Blackberry has had the capability forever and Android phones do it.

I've opted on ordering a Galaxy S4.

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Answer 12

seyss

Level 1

8 points

Jun 8, 2016 3:57 PM in response to AFDeLuca

It's 2016 and this issue still persists.. Apple is really going under the bus.

Dumped Mail app for Gmail (for push) and Outlook, both with smartreply/smartforward.

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Answer 13

Jun 19, 2016 5:34 AM in response to seyss

I don't think Apple will ever implement SmartReplay/SmartForward.

After years of hoping and discussing with a lot of experts, we must except, that the architecture of Mail.app seems to be totally different compared to the mail clients that support ActiveSync in full.

Apple wants to keep it simple and they might be right that too little users would appreciate this option while too many users will be confused and don't see the benefits.

At least replies from iOS devices look the same than the ones from macOS when using the native clients.

I am using Outlook on iOS aside to forward bigger attachments or replying when I know that the sender was using a desktop Outlook and I don't want to ruin the (non-standard!) Word HTML formatting by replying from Mail.app with double spaces etc.

One thing I have learned in all those years of trying to embed iPhones in our Exchange environment with full ActiveSync support: 99% of the users are used to the fact that emails most time look awful when replied from another OS. And since there are many (mobile) OS it's wise to surrender and maybe have a third party app ready to reply from there if really needed.

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