Keyboard Shortcut for Add Hyperlink...or

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Level 1

10 points

Keyboard Shortcut for Add Hyperlink...or

Hello,

I seem to find myself selecting Edit > Add Hyperlink... constantly. It seems that when I send an email with a lengthy hyperlink from my Mac (via a Verio POP server) to my corporate email account (an account which I use Microsoft Outlook 2003 to check and which is hosted on Exchange Server 2000, if that is of help), the hyperlink is always broken at the end of the line when I read the message in Outlook 2003 unless I select the hyperlink in Mail before sending it and use Edit > Add Hyperlink... in order to make it appear immediately underlined. I've configured mail to compose in Rich Text Format thinking that would help, but it doesn't seem to.

I guess my question could be asked two ways: (a) is there a keyboard shortcut for launching the Edit > Add Hyperlink... dialog, or (b) is there something I can do in Mail to get it to send messages that Exchange (or Outlook, who knows who the culprit is) doesn't hack in half?

FWIW, if I send one of these long hyperlinks to myself and check it with Mail, it works just fine. Grr.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

20 iMac G5, Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Posted on Feb 18, 2006 7:13 AM

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Answer 1

andyBall_uk

Level 7

20,516 points

Feb 18, 2006 11:08 AM in response to aeberhar

when you're composing a mail, type a word or words that you want to be clickable, if a single word; ctrl-click with your mouse & you'll get a menu including 'edit link...' - choose this option & paste your long url in the dialog box - hooray! a clickable link.

If it's more than one word that you want clickable; highlight them first, then ctrl-click & 'edit link...' just as before.

I can't be certain that outlook 2003 will read it properly, but it does mean there's no lomg url in the email text.

You should also ensure that Mail- Edit - Attachments - Always send windows friendly attachments is checked.

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Answer 2

aeberhar Author

Level 1

10 points

Feb 20, 2006 1:41 AM in response to andyBall_uk

Hmm. I guess this is a pretty good work-around to going all the way up to the menu bar but a keyboard shortcut would have been faster. I'll try the windows friendly attachment setting and see if that has any affect on the links that I don't use the insert hyperlink command (via menubar or context menu) on.

Thanks for your reply!

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Answer 3

andyBall_uk

Level 7

20,516 points

Feb 20, 2006 2:09 AM in response to aeberhar

If you go to system prefs - keyboard & mouse - keyboard shortcuts you can set a shortcut for anything that is in the mail menus.

click the + at bottom left to add one, select mail from the applications drop down, then type in the exact name of the mail menu item you want a shortcut for eg :Add Hyperlink . Then find a shortcut combo that isn't in use by something else ⚠ & there you are.

I prefer the edit link, so's you get a neat link, rather than the (sometimes) 3 line url.

checking the way mail works while interested in another post

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=367990&tstart=0

we've noticed that mail doesn't send rtf that outlook on an exchange server likes

unless you not only enable rtf, but also actually make some alteration that really requires rtf. That's to say a different font,a larger font, italics, a signature in italics, a colour etc.

The fact that your composed message displays in arial 48pt (for example) doesn't cut it - it'll still be sent as plain unless you do one of the above. Making a change & reversing it works too.

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