Word attachments corrupted (Office 2000)

[rcroese]

After years of successfully opening incoming Word files, suddenly I cannot open some of them. At some point they become corrupted and can only be opened as unformatted text, etc. I cannot figure out why I can open some of them and not others. The incoming Word files are of all versions. Sometimes, when the same file is resent by the original sender, it opens just fine.

I have uninstalled Office 2000 and reinstalled it. This did not solve the problem. I have done a complete Virus check with the latest definitions of NAV. I use Eudora for my e-mail. I also have ZoneAlarmPro running. My e-mail comes in by cable modem.

I cannot pin-point some action that may have started this problem a couple of weeks ago. ZIP files and (seemingly) .rtf files come through fine.

Any and all suggestions would be most welcome and I thank you in advance.

Rob

[Dave]

I had a similar problem some time ago, but it was when using Outlook as the e-mail application. Perhaps there is a related reason.

In Outlook, under Tools/Options/Mail Format there is a checkable box to use MS Word as the e-mail editor. If that is checked, it seemed to cause all sorts of problems with incoming attached files. When unchecked, everything's fine.

Don't know if that helps, but I offer it anyway.

[rcroese]

Dave,

Thanks for your reply, but I find it difficult to correlate the use of an e-mail screen editor in Outlook and incoming Word attachments that go to a subdirectory on the hard drive and are subsequently opened in Word. Seems like a strange coincidence. But, far be it from me to understand the inner workings of computers.

Rob

[jscher2000]

> I use Eudora for my e-mail.

Eudora is a mature program that should be able to parse Word attachments, but if the sender sends as HTML or RTF, the challenge is greater. Similarly, there are settings such as base64 MIME encoding that can cause problems for some mail servers and clients.

Is there any pattern where you have problems when the message body is a format other than plain text, such as RTF, but the attachments to plain text messages are fine? Does it match up with any particular e-mail program on the sending side?