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Vaamsi's avatar
Vaamsi
Copper Contributor
Mar 26, 2025

Adjoining Form Region in Outlook doesn't display title if display language is Right-to-Left language

 

Adjoining Form Region in Outlook does not display title if the display language is set to languages like Arabic, Hebrew etc. (Right to Left languages)

Details

I developed a COM Add-in that uses Form Region to display some text related to the context of the email.
I created an adjoining form region.
For the languages whose flow direction is Left-To-Right, the title of the Form Region is displayed correctly.

When I set the display language of Outlook to Arabic / Hebrew, the <stringOverride> settings of the form region from the Manifest XML are not obeyed.
I don’t see any title on the adjoining form region in this case.
The Flow direction of the Form Region/UI elements has changed to Right-To-Left though.

I am not sure if I am doing something wrong or if it is a bug / known issue in Outlook.
I noticed this is Outlook 2019 and Outlook O365. Did not get to check with other versions of Outlook.

 

I attached the screenshots of what this is.

For English as the display language, this is how it looks.

When I change the display language to Arabic,

I checked with a VSTO Add-in too.
The behaviour is the same.
The code is almost nothing. Just created the project from template and then added the Form Region using New Item.

Steps to reproduce
  1. Create a VSTO Add-in Project for Outlook using Visual Studio’s templates.
  2. Add the Form Region to the project using Right-Click, Add -> New Item and then select Form Region from the available list of options.
  3. Run the project (F5).
  4. Outlook is started and the form region is visible at the bottom of the reading pane.
  5. Do this with Outlook’s display language set to Arabic. The title of the form region is not visible in this case.
  6. Switch back to English as the display language setting. The title of the form region is visible.

 

Any help on this is much appreciated.
Thanks a lot, in advance.

exchange
office 365
outlook for windows
  • DexterHayes's avatar
    DexterHayes
    Iron Contributor
    Mar 27, 2025

    1. Check and repair the language settings
    Make sure the language pack is fully installed:
    Open Windows Settings > Time and Language > Language and confirm that the RIG language pack is installed and is the default display language.
    In Outlook: File > Options > Language, check that editing and display languages are consistent.
    Reinstall the Office language pack:
    Fix or re-add RIG language support through the Office installer.
    2. Verify localization configuration of custom form areas
    Check the ManifestXML of the form region:
    Make sure the < title > or < description > fields contain multilingual resource definitions, for example:
    xml
    <title default="My Form">  
      <language id="en-us">My Form</language>  
      <language id="rig">My Form (RIG)</language>  
    </title>
    Running HTML
    If the title for the RIG language is not defined, a fallback failure may result in whitespace.
    Recreate the form area:
    Use the Outlook Form Designer or Visual Studio to re-export the form region, ensuring that language resources are embedded.
    3. Update or repair Outlook
    Update Office to the latest version:
    Open File > Account > Update Options > Update Now.
    Verify that the latest patch has been installed (language related bugs may have been fixed).
    Run Outlook in safe mode:
    Press Win + R and enter outlook.exe / safe to test whether the title is displayed properly (to exclude plug-in interference).
    4. Advanced Search (Developer / Administrator)
    Check registry key values:
    Navigate toHKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\FormRegions，Make sure there are no mandatory language coverage settings.
    Track with Process Monitor:
    Use ProcMon to monitor the behavior of Outlook when it loads a language resource to check for access to the wrong source file.

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