The Entourage User's WebLog

Did you know there was an easy way to have nice looking signatures at the end of your messages? You can, by using HTML messages and signatures make good use of size, colour and styling. This is nothing new. However, many people do not realise that you can also include images in your signatures!

Here's how.

First, from the Tools menu, choose 'Signatures'. Click on the 'New' button to make a new, empty signature. The text in the 'Name' box will be highlighted, ready for you to give this signature a name to identify it. Then, click the 'Use HTML' button in the signature window's toolbar - this is the button with the 'ab/ab' symbol:

This will make the text in the signature field HTML and activate the font & styling buttons in the toolbar. Now, you can design your signature. Remember, the signature is intended to be an adjunct to your message, so would normally be better set in small, low key colours and fonts. For simple signatures that's all you need to do. Just close the signature window to save your work. In order to use the signature, when you create a new message you can select this as the signature from the Signature button in the message toolbar - the one that looks like a fountain pen

If the signature text appears, but not the colours and styling, you need to make the message use HTML, or it can only use the plain text of the signature. Turn on message HTML in the same way you did for the signature window, by clicking on the 'ab/ab' symbol. Better still, you can assign a particular signature as the default. Open up the Account Settings window. From the Tools menu; choose 'Accounts' and double-click the account to open its settings window. Select the 'Options' pane, and the first option is the signature to use on this account's messages by default. Select the signature you just created from the drop-down menu. To set the default mail format to HTML so you don't need to switch it on each time, go to the Entourage application preferences (Entourage menu; 'Preferences'). Select 'Compose' and in the 'General' section there are drop-down menus for the default format for mail and news messages. Set these to HTML.

Now, create a new mail message, and you should see your pretty HTML signature appear, just like magic

OK, that's the first stage, now let's add a graphic image. Remember, these will be added to every message you send, so unless you want your correspondents to be seriously cheesed off at you, keep the graphic as small as you possibly can! Again, discreet and retiring should be the order of ther day.

Open the signature for editing, making sure that HTML formatting is turned on. Put the insertion point where you want your image to appear and select 'Insert', then 'Picture' from the Message menu. This will let you select a picture to insert, using the standard file selction dialog. Note that you can also insert Background Images that will be displayed as a background to the full message when your recipient opens it (in those email clients that support the feature). You could also insert sounds and movies, but that's probably complete overkill for an email signature!

Finally, if you're not the creative kind, there are some excellent examples on the Mactopia web site. Use these as a starting point to design your own signatures. Here's mine:

Please feel free to leave a comment using the links below - comments on this article or requests for future articles are always welcome and will be responded to where appropriate.