Gmail has always been my choice of online email clients, but one thing that is frustrating is that HTML signatures aren’t supported within the composition area. Well, Gmail can actually handle them there is just no easy way to have the signature automatically inserted with each message…until now.
Garett Rogers from Googling Google has stepped up to the plate and has figured out a way to automate the insertion of an HTML signature into the messages that you compose. The trick is nothing too extravagant but you will need to have Greasemonkey installed to get the job done. Here is what you have to do:
- Download and install Greasemonkey if you don’t already have it.
- Install the script
- You’ll need to have the HTML code for the signature that you want to insert. Once you have that just go to the Greasemonkey script manager and edit the script’s HTML signature. I have a screenshot of my code below.
So it is pretty easy to setup. To test it out I added the script to my Greasemonkey then went to the Greasemonkey script management window and edited the script from there. Here is a screenshot of the HTML text I used to generate the signature pictured above:
The image in the signature is compliments of the Feedburner Headline Animator which I discuss in this post about making email signatures. It is an effective way to show off the latest posts from your blog or site, and the background is customizable so that you can make it unique to your site. Using that together with this Greasemonkey script is a great solution for anyone looking to attract new readers…especially if you send out a lot of emails. The great thing about this script is that a nice looking signature is no longer a pain to use in Gmail. Thanks Garett!
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Tags: Google, Gmail, Greasemonkey, Hacks
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- CyberNotes: How To Create A Great Email Signature
Well, followed the instructions to the letter, but getting no signature block in my version of Gmail. Might the URLs be different for us over here in the UK?
That didn’t even cross my mind. I take it that your URL’s don’t look like:
http://mail.google.com/
and instead look like:
http://mail.google.co.uk
If that is true then you need to adjust the “@include” lines because that specifies which sites to apply the script to. Let me know if you have any problems with that.
Cool trick thanks.
The URL for my ‘compose’ page looks like this:
https://mail.google.com/mail/?auth=stupidly long string of characters]]=[[eleven characters]]&shva=1
- or sometimes just:
https://mail.google.com/mail/
I wondered if the /mail/ bit might be the problem, but I tried splicing that in, still no joy. Probably because neither URL looks anything like the ones in the script manager! I’ve tried all the different ‘views’ of Gmail, too. Anyone else having problems, here, or just me?
Actually Gmail uses frames so even though the URL may appear to be one thing the actual frame that the script is targeting is a little different. The script worked right away for me and as long as your Gmail is a .com address I wouldn’t think that you would have any other issues. I can’t think of anything else to help you.
I installed Greasemonkey and the script, and it fits our needs perfectly, except for one detail.
How can I insert signatures in Replies? This does not seem to work by default?
It should still work for replies. I’m not sure why that’s not working for ya. Works for me.
I don’t follow the instructions.
I’ve installed Greasemonkey and the script. I’ve got a small monkey icon in the bottom right of my Firefox window. I used the right-mouse button to click on that icon and select ‘Manage User Scripts’. In the left-hand panel is a script called ‘HTML Signatures for GMail’. I’ve edited that script but what happens next. How does that script then get added to my GMail signature?
In GMail there is a settings page where you can assign a signature but I don’t know what I’m meant to enter there.
Thanks.
It’s automatically inserted for your which is why this is so great. Just go to compose an email message in Gmail and it should automatically insert the signature before you even start typing!
You should probably disable your Gmail signature though otherwise the signature inserted by Greasemonkey AND the Gmail signature will both be added. This Greasemonkey script has nothing to do with the signature option in the Gmail settings…they are independent of eachother.
Let me know if that helps at all.
Thanks for clarifying that. If the signature consists of just text then it works fine, but as soon as I introduce any HTML elements into the signature then it stops working. I’ll have to experiment further and see if I can get it to work.
I’m sure you’re just making a small mistake somewhere. One thing that you want to watch for that is a common mistake when doing this kind of stuff is that the entire HTML string is surrounded by single quotes. If you have any other single quotes, also known as apostrophes, in the actually signature itself it will mess up how it works. You can still use single quotes in your signature, all you have to do is put a slash (\) before the single quote…or you can just use the double quotes as seen in my example above.
You were right. I was using double quotes around the entire HTML string rather than single quotes. Works fine now
I’m glad that was the problem…if only everything was such a simple fix.
Greetings everyone
I’m a noob on html
how can i put a single picture in my signature
for example don’t work
Greetings everyone
I’m a noob on html
how can i put a single picture in my signature
img src=”http://tech.cybernetnews.com/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_exclaim.gif”for example don’t work
I use an image in my example signature above.