«

Hello,

I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.

Nothing I seem to have will open it.

What can I use, please ?
Running W7.

Thanks,
B.

In news:i2nbhq$cqr$ Bob
<> wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.
>
> Nothing I seem to have will open it.
>
> What can I use, please ?
> Running W7.

Ask the person who sent it to you.


--
Bert Hyman St. Paul, MN

On Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:20:23 -0400, Bob wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.
>
> Nothing I seem to have will open it.
>
> What can I use, please ?
> Running W7.
>
> Thanks,
> B.

If it's a small size file try notepad.
Generally these are standard text files.

Bob wrote:

> I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.

Is this email from someone you know or is it from an unknown source?

Is the name of the attachment winmail.dat or something else .dat?

> Nothing I seem to have will open it.
>
> What can I use, please ?
> Running W7.

Win7 does not come with a mail user agent and you failed to mention
which agent you have installed - perhaps it is Windows Live Mail or
perhaps you are using the Tbird 3.0.3 for mail that you posted here with.

The .dat extension is 'arbitrary' and is not associated with a
particular application, indicating that the person who sent it to you
doesn't know very much about interacting with others by email.

The most notorious group of people who don't know much about interacting
with others by email are those who use MS specific/proprietary apps such
as OL Outlook.

It would/might help if you look at the attachment structure. You can do
this with WLM by using ctrl-F3 and you can do it with Tbird by using ctrl-U

If the problem is an OL attachment there are instructions you should
give the sender to quit doing that. If the problem is some other kind
of attachment, you need to get back with us about the attachment
structure seen in the message source.

You can also save the .dat file to disk and examine its front part with
a hex viewer.



--
Mike Easter

On Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:48:00 -0400, Alec Lourmier wrote:

> On Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:27:24 -0400, richard <>
> wrote:
>
>>If it's a small size file try notepad.
>>Generally these are standard text files.
>
> .bin? As in, binary?

No moron. He said ".dat" as in "DATA".
FYI bin does not necessarily mean binary either. You have heard of "Recycle
Bin"? "Bin" simple means a receptacle. Loosely.

Bob wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.
>
> Nothing I seem to have will open it.
>
> What can I use, please ?

Dollars to doughnuts the person that sent it to you is
using Outlook (not Express). It's a problem with Outlook
that M$ refuses to do anything about and it's been around
for years. Google...

outlook .dat

and you'll find a ton of information. There are some
free Outlook .dat converters out there. Or you can
instruct your friend on how to prevent it in the
future.

Oh, and never listen to richard.

--
Jordon

Mike Easter "contributed" in 24hoursupport.helpdesk:

> Bob wrote:
>
>> I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.
>
> Is this email from someone you know or is it from an unknown source?
>
> Is the name of the attachment winmail.dat or something else .dat?
>
>> Nothing I seem to have will open it.
>>
>> What can I use, please ?
>> Running W7.
>
> Win7 does not come with a mail user agent and you failed to mention
> which agent you have installed - perhaps it is Windows Live Mail or
> perhaps you are using the Tbird 3.0.3 for mail that you posted here
> with.
>
> The .dat extension is 'arbitrary' and is not associated with a
> particular application, indicating that the person who sent it to you
> doesn't know very much about interacting with others by email.
>
> The most notorious group of people who don't know much about
> interacting with others by email are those who use MS
> specific/proprietary apps such as OL Outlook.
>
> It would/might help if you look at the attachment structure. You can
> do this with WLM by using ctrl-F3 and you can do it with Tbird by
> using ctrl-U
>
> If the problem is an OL attachment there are instructions you should
> give the sender to quit doing that. If the problem is some other kind
> of attachment, you need to get back with us about the attachment
> structure seen in the message source.
>
> You can also save the .dat file to disk and examine its front part
> with a hex viewer.
>
>
>

Mike, the OP doesn't even know how to open an email with some .dat
extension. Now how would (s)he know what a hex viewer is all about, eh?

--
<snip>

On Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:48:00 -0400, Alec Lourmier wrote:

> On Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:27:24 -0400, richard <> wrote:
>
>>If it's a small size file try notepad. Generally these are standard text
>>files.
>
> .bin? As in, binary?

No, dat.as in data.



--
"Snakes! Sons of vipers! How will you escape the judgement of hell?"
Matthew 23:33.
The whole chapter is cool, too.

"Bob" <> wrote in message
news:i2nbhq$cqr$...
> Hello,
>
> I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.
>
> Nothing I seem to have will open it.
>
> What can I use, please ?
> Running W7.
>
> Thanks,
> B.



Bob

The sender screwed up.
Just ask them to resend in the format they 'meant' to send it as.


Best
Paul.

Bob wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I received an Attachment in an e-mail with a .dat extension.
>
> Nothing I seem to have will open it.
>
> What can I use, please ?
> Running W7.
>
> Thanks,
> B.

RTF (Rich-Text Format) is often used to describe one of Microsoft's mode
for formatting e-mails. RTF actually includes HTML but usually means to
refer to Microsoft's TNEF format. The only e-mail client that
understands RTF (TNEF) is Microsoft's Outlook e-mail program. Not even
Microsoft's Outlook Express, a completely separate e-mail client that
they obtained elsewhere when it used to be called Internet Mail and News
(hence the msimn.exe filename), can understand RTF used in Outlook. All
other e-mail clients - you never bothered to say what YOU use - will
show a winmail.dat attachment (except for Outlook Express which won't
show the attachment). The winmail.dat attachment contains all the
formatting specified in the RTF document.

RTF/TNEF should only be used within a closed community of Outlook users,
like employees at the same company. It should also be used only when
Exchange is the only mail server involved since corruption can occur if
using non-Exchange servers. This type of environment works at a
company, not when sending e-mails across the Internet. Plain-text or
HTML should be used when sending e-mails to Internet recipients. In
fact, a user configurable option in Outlook says to convert RTF e-mails
into HTML e-mails if sending to an Internet recipient.

Tell the sender to resend their RTF e-mail but use plain-text or HTML
format. Windows 7 doesn't come with any e-mail client. You never
bothered to tell use what e-mail client you chose to install. If you
didn't install Outlook then you either need to get the e-mail sent in
plain-text or HTML format, or you'll have to endure installing 3rd party
software that can view the winmail.dat file, like Winmail Opener.

http://www.google.com/search?q=site:support.microsoft.com+"winmail.dat"