pasting word text into mail produces formatting-type gibberish

Plain or Rich Text does not matter. I get the same result.

I should also mention that this situation seems sporadic, meaning it does not happen all the time. When it occurs, it continues until something causes it to stop. Rebooting Word, Mail, logging out and back into the (non-admin) account, or restarting the Mac does not get it to stop. I've seen it stop just from the computer sleeping overnight.

I've not been able to narrow down what seems to trigger the effect, or causes it to no longer occur. I originally thought that it might be due to some corruption in one particular Word document that I have open most of the time. But that's not it.

My current suspicion revolves around the fact that I have the Mac set to wake automatically in the middle of the night in order for the Unix CRON scripts to run automatically. That plausibly could explain how the effect sometimes stops overnight, but not what action is prompting it in the first place.

sudo -intellect wrote:

Hi 🙂

Try an intermedium. Like TextEdit. Paste into TextEdit, then copy and paste into Mail. To be absolutely sure to strip text down completely, I often use the Google search window at the top right of the Safari window. Paste into this window, select all, copy and paste over to Mail.

Sudo intellect:

The problem appears to be sporadic, and with this particular version of Mail. Workarounds are fine when nothing else works. My objective is to find the cause of this problem, which I've never before seen, literally using every Mac OS and every version of Word since the early 1980s (original Mac).

sudo -intellect wrote:

There is quite often "hidden" formatting code that appears when cutting and pasting text from one program into another. I would imagine this would absolutely happen between Word 2008 and Apple Mail. This doesn't mean there is anything wrong with your system. It is commonplace to use an intermedium as I previously suggested. You have to experiment to see what works. My Google/Safari suggestion always works when TextEdit doesn't.

Sudo -intellect:

By definition, there always is hidden formatting information (when such is available) in the Mac OS copy function, otherwise one could not paste into another document with formatting intact. Contrary to your assertion, the problem is something wrong with either the running versions of the system or the Mail application. Otherwise, the problem would be fully repeatable and not sporadic.

Problem Update:

I have been able to get a pretty consistent reoccurence of this problem this afternoon: When pasting by way of the Mail "Paste and Match Style" option (something I don't recall using before). This occurs when pasting the same copied text into Mail via Paste and Match Style, either in Plain Text or Rich Text formatting. Using oridinary "Paste" on the same copied text produces no formatting gibberish, at least not at present.

BDAqua:

I cannot correlate to any file saving in Word, or any file open in Word.

Moreover, I cannot see the formatting gibberish when pasting the very same copied text in any other application I have available (or document) other than Mail.

The Mac copy function, by design, captures the copied text formatting in order to paste text completely with the original formatting. Some applications (like Word) have an option to paste copied text into a document "unformatted."which causes (in Word) the pasted text to take on the formatting of the paragraph into which it is inserted.

Mail has no such function of which I'm aware.

Accordingly, this appears to be a Mail issue, or at least an issue with my currently running version of Mail. The fact that the problem will fix itself with the machine sleeping overnight, possibly due to automated CRON scripts running in the wee hours, adds to the confusion.

The problem does not seem to be associated with any particular Word document. Indeed, I've tried tried to test several existing documents as well as creating some anew in order to find some sort of consistent repeatability.

The problem seems to be associated with Mail. I'm next going to try to see if I can create the problem with text orinating from other applications.

The only repeatability I've thus found has to do with using Mail's "Paste and Match Style" function. But it often occurs with just "Paste."

When it occurs, I find myself simply highlighting and deleting the formatting gibberish in order to send the mail on.

I've also found the situation occuring at times in "quoted" text that I am forwarding or in reply emails.

It doesn't happen all the time. It does get to become a nuisance, however, when it occurs, espeically when I'm in the middle of trying to get soem work done.

Texas Mac Man:

RE your "I experience this most of the time," I never experienced it previously (OS 10.4 and earlier, even OS9).

I wonder if perhaps this is something associated with OS 10.5?

Noting that you apparently still use 10.4.11, do you recall experiencing this with that OS and the verison of Mail associated with such?