Remove ~20px gap at right side of HTML mail on iOS - iphone

Recently I have been working on a contact form for my portfolio website. The form works and I have managed to successfully send HTML mail from the server it's hosted on to my email address. Like most of my emails, these will be primarily read on my iPod Touch so the theme I based the mail template on is engineered for a screen 320px by 480px.
Even though the mail container element is set to width:100% and the same on all inner elements, there is a ~20px gap at the right side of the screen, as if that's the edge of the document:
Here is the script and style-sheet for reference:
PHP (snippet), request_form.php:
...
$email_subject = "Graphic Request - ".clean_string($first_name);
$email_message .= '<html><head><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1, maximum-scale=1, user-scalable=0"/><link rel="stylesheet" href="http://blieque.comli.com/mail-styles.css" type="text/css"></head><body><table id="all" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">';
$email_message .= '<tr><td id="head"><h1>New Request</h1></td></tr>';
$email_message .= '<tr><td class="info"><span id="param">Name:</span> '.clean_string($first_name).'</td></tr>';
$email_message .= '<tr><td class="info sub"><span id="param">Email Address:</span> '.clean_string($email_from).'</td></tr>';
$email_message .= '<tr><td class="info sub"><span id="param">Service:</span> '.clean_string($service).'</td></tr>';
$email_message .= '<tr><td class="info sub jstfy"><span id="param">Details:</span> '.clean_string($request).'</td></tr>';
$email_message .= '<tr><td id="foot"></td></tr></table></body></html>';
...
CSS, mail-styles.css:
body {
margin: 0 !important;
font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
color: #242424 !important;
text-decoration: none !important;
}
#all {
width: 110%;
}
#head {
background: #1393A1;
color: #61BDC7;
border-bottom: solid 0.5em #61BDC7;
width: 100%;
padding: 1em 0.5em;
height: 20px;
}
td.sub {
border-top: solid 0.25em #1393a1;
}
td.info {
padding: 0.35em 0.5em;
font-size: 12pt;
}
td.jstfy {
text-align: justify;
}
span#param {
color: #1393a1;
font-weight: bold;
}
td[class=info] {
text-transform: capitalize;
}
#foot {
background: #1393a1;
width: 100%;
height: 20px;
color: transparent;
border-top: solid 0.5em #61BDC7;
}
#line {
background: #1393a1;
width: 94%;
height: 0.25em;
margin-left: auto;
margin-right: auto;
}
The email also doesn't work well with online email viewers as they tend to have their own overriding style-sheets for common tags like <h1>. I hope the solution is something obvious.

This worked for me:
html, body {
width: 100%;
padding: 0;
margin: 0;
}
When I used min-width instead of width, the content got too wide. I also have these viewport settings in my header:
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" />

You could try adding min-width: 100% to the <body> element to deal with the gap.
And as the others suggested, moving your styles inline should deal with the rest of your problems.

Maybe try
html, body {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
}

HTML emails don't handle external stylesheets very well so this may be your problem.
You should only use inline styles on HTML emails as a general rule of thumb.
Here's a good guide on HTML emails:
http://kb.mailchimp.com/article/how-to-code-html-emails

This is happening because body has padding by default on most browsers. add:
body{
padding:0px;
}

I've dealt with this issue numerous times. Every time it occurs I always realize that it's happening because I'm using cellpadding incorrectly on one of my tables.
For example, I got caught up for a bit today because near the bottom of one of the emails I was working on there is a table with a press banner that stretches horizontally across the bottom like this:
<center><!-- Press Banner -->
<table border="0" cellpadding="15" cellspacing="0" bgcolor="#ffffff">
<tr>
<td align="center">
<a role="link" href="#" target="_blank" title="#">
<span class="press">
<img class="desktop" src="#" border="0" style="display:block;">
</span>
</a>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</center>
That image is 600 pixels wide and is switched for a 320 pixel wide background image for the mobile layout. I needed to add some vertical spacing between that block and the others so I chose to add cellpadding="15" to do so, without realizing that 15 pixels would also stretch out horizontally. But on the iOS device this is extra space only renders on the right side, not the left, so its not obvious what the problem is.
To fix it, I removed the cellpadding and used table spacers instead on the top and bottom.
<tr>
<td><table border="0" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="0"><tr><td height="4"><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></td>
</tr>
There are many other reasons that this issue could occur as other people have already mentioned, but just adding this potential cause for anyone else who may be overlooking the same error that I made.
Additionally as a rule of thumb, you should never import CSS in an HTML email, you should inline as much style as possible and use depreciated CSS2 tags and oldschool HTML styling elements whenever possible to achieve the highest level of cross device, client compability. I recently uploaded a project to github(link) which is the html email template I've created while building emails for some time. It's pretty much the most compatible template you'll find anywhere.

Related

how can I add cellspacing to pdftable when parsing html using XMLWorker and itext

I am using XMLWorker and itext to convert html to pdf .
my html have a table and I need to set it's cellspacing =0 cellpadding=0 .
does anyone know how to do it ?
in html I saw I can replace it by setting the style :
border-collapse: collapse;
border-spacing: 0px ;
border : 0;
padding : 0;
thanks
Tami
I've tried what you're doing using the CSS you propose and it works for me:
You can find my test here: ParseHtmlTable5
This is my HTML (including the CSS): table3_css.html
<html>
<head>
<style>
table, td {
border: 1px solid green;
border-spacing: 0px;
padding: 0px;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<table class='test'>
<tr>
<th>Firstname</th>
<th>Lastname</th>
<th>Savings</th>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Peter</td>
<td>Griffin</td>
<td>$100</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Lois</td>
<td>Griffin</td>
<td>$150</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Joe</td>
<td>Swanson</td>
<td>$300</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Cleveland</td>
<td>Brown</td>
<td>$250</td>
</tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
I suggest that you compare your HTML with mine to find out what you're doing wrong.
You should also use the latest version of XML Worker and iText(Sharp) as we've improved HTML parsing significantly in the latest releases.
Note that I've defined a solid, green border of 1px to prove that there is no padding and no spacing between the cells. If you change the CSS like this:
<style>
table, td {
border: 0px;
border-spacing: 0px;
padding: 0px;
}
</style>
You'll get the (ugly) version of a table without borders, without spacing between the cells and without padding inside the cells.

CSS div buttons not working on Iphone or Ipad

I am working on a web base app for my school with different versions of CSS for handheld, tablet and desktop. I am using media queries for this. The app is almost done and it works correctly on almost all browsers and android. The app looks awesome on Iphone/Ipad however buttons do not work making the app useless in these devices.
This is what I have:
//Source code
<div id="signinbutton" class="blue_button">Sign In</div>
//desktop.CSS
.blue_button {
width: 130px;
height: auto;
padding: 8px;
margin: 0% auto 20% auto;
background-image:url(../../images/bluebar5.png);
color: #FFF;
text-align: center;
font-family: "Lucida Sans Unicode", "Lucida Grande", Sans-Serif;
font-size: 14pt;
font-weight: bolder;
-moz-border-radius: 10px;
-webkit-border-radius: 10px;
border-radius: 10px;
cursor: default;
}
.blue_button:hover {
opacity: 0.7;
}
//Handheld.css (this overwrites css on desktop)
.blue_button {
width: 260px;
font-size: 18pt;
background-image:url(../../images/bluebar6.png);
}
I tried applying the style to #signinbutton without success.
You should use a <button> or <input type="button"> tag instead of a div. While the <div> button functionality may work in some browsers, it can be a bit of a hack compared to the traditional button tags
You can wrap your div around <a> like this. It's perfectly valid with html5 now.
<div id="signinbutton" class="blue_button">Sign In</div>
You just need to adjust
Reference:
https://css-tricks.com/snippets/jquery/make-entire-div-clickable/
Try adding to the style of the div {cursor:pointer}.

Seamless scaling of website header on the iphone.

I have a website (http://ukchina-trading.com/) with the following header:
HTML
<div class='leftImage'>
<img src='image/unionjack.png'>
</div>
<div class='title'>
<h1>J Plus Trading</h1>
<h2>Briding the gap between China and the UK</h2>
</div>
<div class='rightImage'>
<img src='image/chinawings.png'>
</div>
CSS
.title h1 {
font-family: 'Droid Serif', Georgia, Times, serif;
text-align: center;
font-size: 68px;
line-height: 65px;
padding-top: 60px;
margin-bottom: 80px;
}
.title h2 {
font-family: 'Droid Serif', Georgia, Times, serif;
text-align: center;
position:relative;
top:-88px;
left:3px;
font-size: 16px;
color: #FF3300;
}
.rightImage {
position:absolute;
right: 150px;
top: 2px;
}
.leftImage {
position:absolute;
left: 150px;
top: 2px;
}
When the website is view on a computer the header is fine, but when viewed on the iphone screen the images are pushed over the title, hiding it.
What is the best way to redo the header to stop this?
I'd suggest the best thing to do would be to bring the flags inside the 900px width of the website.
Keep them to the left and right of the "J Plus Trading" text but just use floats rather than absolute positioning.
your problem is the absolute positioning you are using, as this causes the images to be in the same position regardless of anything else on the page. instead of absolute try using float:left; and float:right on your left and right images, and this way the text will not be pushed over it. you may have to create extra containing divs with margins or padding so that the images are positioned how you want them

Centering divs in HTML and CSS but cut-off on mobile screens

I have been having some real issues with CSS!
I have the following set up to centre the #Box div, which works perfectly on everything but mobile browsers. Because the screen size of the mobile browser is so narrow the left hand side keeps getting cut-off. I asked something similar previously and have tried to no avail to adjust it.
I have put the container and layout divs in since last time, but still the same problem occurs. Is there any way that I can adjust the code so that the left hand side doesn't keep getting chopped off?
.pageContainer {
margin-left: auto;
margin-right: auto;
width: 100%;
height: auto;
padding-left: 1.82%;
padding-right: 1.82%;
position:relative; }
#LayoutDiv1 {
clear: both;
margin: auto;
width: 100%;
display: block;
text-align:center;
position: relative; }
#Box {
width: 487px;
height: 181px;
position: absolute;
left: 50%;
top: 236px;
margin-left: -244px;
z-index:6; }
The html:
<body>
<div class="pageContainer">
<div id="LayoutDiv1">
<div id="Twitter">
<img src="images/TwitterNORMAL.png" onmouseover="this.src='images/TwitterHOVER.png'" onmouseout="this.src='images/TwitterNORMAL.png'"/>
</div>
<div id="Facebook">
<img src="images/fbNORMAL.png" onMouseOver="this.src='images/fbHOVER.png'" onMouseOut="this.src='images/fbNORMAL.png'"/>
</div>
<div>
<img id="Box" src="images/BOX.png" width="487" height="181">
</div>
</div>
</div>
</body>
The smarter way in 2012 to do this is to use Media Queries, some inspiration here
You basically create another style sheet which is loaded only for smaller screens. It might seem like an overkill now, but as your website grows, you will thank me for suggesting this (or you cannot ;))
Also, don't do margin-left: -244px;, its hacky and can cause cross browser issues. Show us some HTML and we shall show you a cleaner way.
Are you including a viewport meta tag? It should eliminate any scaling issues you may be having in mobile.
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1, maximum-scale=1">
To you CSS: <div>s are block elements, and their default behavior is to expand the width of their parent (100%). Those CSS declarations aren't necessary.
From your code, and layout, it doesn't look like you need #LayoutDiv1 or to use positioning.
This simpler code takes care of the left-side-cutoff (here's a fiddle):
.pageContainer {
margin:0 auto;
}
#LayoutDiv1 {
margin: auto;
text-align:center;
}
#Box {
width: 487px;
height: 181px;
top: 236px;
margin:236px auto 0;
}
And like a prev poster mentioned, you could add a #media query to load a smaller image for #Box on mobile (you can simply add a line or two [or 200] to your existing CSS file):
#media only screen and (max-width: 767px) {
#Box { background:url('imgs/mobile-hero.jpg'); }
}

Removing CSS Margin on iPad / iPhone

On an e-commerce website that I set-up Link on a page that has 4 alternative product views (they are the 4 small images underneath the add to basket) On an iPhone or iPad the 4th image isn't having its right margin removed so it goes onto the next line.
Basically each images has a 10px right margin, and then the last image that has a class of 'end' has a right margin of '0px !important'.
This works fine in web browsers but on the iPad / iPhone the 0px right margin is not being applied.
I have a feeling this is going to be an easy one but I just can't see it, thanks in advance for any help.
EDIT I have added the code below and have also set-up a stripped down version of the page I am having the problems on: link, it is the 4 small images at the bottom of the right hand side.
Below is the HTML for the images:
<div class="image-additional">
<img alt="" title="" src="larchblue-cr-55x55.jpg" class="thumb ">
<img alt="" title="" src="larchgreen-cr-55x55.jpg" class="thumb ">
<img alt="" title="" src="larchpink-cr-55x55.jpg" class="thumb ">
<img alt="" title="" src="larchyellow-cr-55x55.jpg" class="thumb end">
</div>
And here is the CSS:
.image-additional {
width: 268px;
margin-top: 13px;
clear: both;
position: absolute;
bottom: 0;
overflow: hidden;
}
.image-additional img {
border: 1px solid #E7E7E7;
margin-right: 10px;
}
.image-additional img.end, .image-additional img:last-child {
margin-right: 0px !important;
}
Try using :last-child pseudo element for your mobile targets.
.img:last-child {
margin-right: 0px;
}
Note: It works everywhere except for IE8 and below.