Opening email text documents

[Guest]

Hi I receive emails from a friend with attachments, but, for some reason,
when I open some of them, all I see is a jumble of letters and symbols. I
have tried opening them in notepad but it is still the same.
Can any one advise me of what I should be opening it with to read it.
When I click properties, all it says is 'txt'
Many thanks in advance.
Pauline

 

[Ramesh, MS-MVP]

Pauline,

Looks like a binary file attachment, with a .txt extension. It's a good idea
to ask the sender about the file type, and the associated program that can
open it.

If not, see the guide here which explains how to identify and decode mail
attachments:

Decoding Internet Attachments - A Tutorial:
http://pages.prodigy.net/michael_santovec/decode.htm#identify

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User

Windows XP Troubleshooting
http://www.winhelponline.com


Hi I receive emails from a friend with attachments, but, for some reason,
when I open some of them, all I see is a jumble of letters and symbols. I
have tried opening them in notepad but it is still the same.
Can any one advise me of what I should be opening it with to read it.
When I click properties, all it says is 'txt'
Many thanks in advance.
Pauline

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Hi I receive emails from a friend with attachments, but, for some
reason, when I open some of them, all I see is a jumble of letters
and symbols. I have tried opening them in notepad but it is still
the same.
Can any one advise me of what I should be opening it with to read it.

To access a file correctly, you need to use an appropriate program for
*that* particular file type. What program that is depends on the file type.

When I click properties, all it says is 'txt'

Is the file name something.txt? If so, it's identified as a text file and
notepad should be able to read it. If notepad displays garbage characters,
then it's obviously *not* text, despite what its name indicates, and has
been misnamed. You should check with your friend to find out specifically
what he sent you.

 

[PA Bear]

What attachments?

 

[Plato]

Hi I receive emails from a friend with attachments, but, for some reason,
when I open some of them, all I see is a jumble of letters and symbols. I

Save the attachment to a new folder. Then use the same app to open it as
the app it was created with. Ask the sender of the app to find out what
app he/she used to create it.