Want to forward messages with images in Evolution E-mail client

Problem

I use the E-mail client Evolution running under Linux (Debian Buster distribution), version 3.30.5-1.1. I also configure it to default to Plain Text format when creating new messages.

I found that when I get a HTML message with embedded images and want to forward it to someone else, the text is forwarded but not the images, even when I set the forwarded message’s format to HTML (instead of Plain Text).

This happens in all four possible ways of forwarding the message (Forward As Attached, Forward As Inline, Forward As Quoted, Redirect).

Solution

The workaround I found is to reconfigure Evolution to default to HTML format before forwarding the message, and return to Plain Text afterwards. So when I click on the Forward button and Evolution initially constructs the message to be forwarded, it includes all contents of the original message, including the embedded images.

To reconfigure the default message format:

1. Open the “Evolution Preferences” pop up dialog: Edit / Preferences.
2. Select the pop up dialog pane: Composer Preferences / General.
3. Toggle checkmark in Default Behavior / Format messages in HTML.
4. Click on the Close button at bottom right of the dialog.

After defaulting to HTML format, forwarding an HTML-formatted message with images preserves the images, in all four possible ways of forwarding the message.

(Submitted to gitlab.gnome.org as Evolution issue #1406 and to bugs.debian.org as bug #984599.)