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#1
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can't open file I emailed myself with bad extension
I can't open several chapters of my dissertation, this is a
crisis. I was working on a Mac, OS X. Don't know which version of Word, but recent. I am at home with my PC, Windows XP. I sent myself, then deleted, several chapters that were named like this: myname.chapter7.final Now I have a bunch of attachments that I can't open. They give me gibberish. I went in and added the extension ".doc" but it doesn't make any difference, still garbage. A few files I sent, such as titlepage.doc, I can open with no problem. Is there anything I can do to open these? |
#2
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Are you trying to open them from within Word? Word will recognize its own
files even without the .doc extension. -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. "vic" wrote in message ... I can't open several chapters of my dissertation, this is a crisis. I was working on a Mac, OS X. Don't know which version of Word, but recent. I am at home with my PC, Windows XP. I sent myself, then deleted, several chapters that were named like this: myname.chapter7.final Now I have a bunch of attachments that I can't open. They give me gibberish. I went in and added the extension ".doc" but it doesn't make any difference, still garbage. A few files I sent, such as titlepage.doc, I can open with no problem. Is there anything I can do to open these? |
#3
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Yes, I am trying to open them within Word. If everything I
saved was gibberish, it would make more sense, but the files that were saved with a .doc extension are fine. Are there any programs which will recover trashed files? Vic -----Original Message----- Are you trying to open them from within Word? Word will recognize its own files even without the .doc extension. -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. "vic" wrote in message ... I can't open several chapters of my dissertation, this is a crisis. I was working on a Mac, OS X. Don't know which version of Word, but recent. I am at home with my PC, Windows XP. I sent myself, then deleted, several chapters that were named like this: myname.chapter7.final Now I have a bunch of attachments that I can't open. They give me gibberish. I went in and added the extension ".doc" but it doesn't make any difference, still garbage. A few files I sent, such as titlepage.doc, I can open with no problem. Is there anything I can do to open these? . |
#4
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If you emailed them from the Mac to the Windows machine, the problem may be
attachment encoding, but that's not fixable if you already deleted them on the Mac machine. Suzanne pretty much said this, but did you specifically try using File | Open in Word and navigate to the files? It that doesn't work, you may at least be able to use File | Open with type set to Recover Text from Any File to recover the basic text. For future reference, investigate flash drives. And note that you shouldn't use periods in filenames *except* for extensions, it confuses the computers. Try an underscore or simple capitalization instead--e.g. MitchellChapter7Final.doc. If on the Mac, you only moved them to the trash, they may still be in the trash and resending them might help--preferably control-click on the Mac and Create Archive to save them as .zip files which are less likely to get corrupted in transit. And check the attachment encoding: There's no difference in the Word file format (since Word 97), it's a question of how the attachment is encoded by the email program. A Mac email program, Entourage, has this to say in Help: About attachment encodings When you choose an encoding format, it is helpful to understand how Macintosh files differ from files created on other computers. Macintosh files include additional resource information that files created on other types of computers do not. If you are sending a data file, such as a Microsoft Word document or Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, such resource information may not be necessary. However, if you are sending something more complex, such as a program, to another Macintosh computer, you must choose an encoding format that preserves all the data. The AppleDouble encoding format preserves the additional resource information, and can be read by both Macintosh and other types of computers. AppleDouble is a good choice for your default encoding format; it works most of the time with most computers. However, if AppleDouble fails, you can choose a different encoding format depending on the type of computer you are sending the attachment to: € To send an attachment to a Macintosh computer, use BinHex, which preserves the Macintosh resource information and data. € To send an attachment to a Windows-based computer, use MIME/Base 64, which preserves the data only. € To send an attachment to a UNIX computer, use UUEncode, which preserves the data only. Try sending this explanation to your correspondent, asking them to change their encoding. The help on any Mac email program will tell them how. If you see something about "application/x-macbinary" when trying to open the doc, sounds like they encoded it for Mac computers. DM Mac MVP for Word On 1/5/05 4:55 PM, "vic" wrote: I can't open several chapters of my dissertation, this is a crisis. I was working on a Mac, OS X. Don't know which version of Word, but recent. I am at home with my PC, Windows XP. I sent myself, then deleted, several chapters that were named like this: myname.chapter7.final Now I have a bunch of attachments that I can't open. They give me gibberish. I went in and added the extension ".doc" but it doesn't make any difference, still garbage. A few files I sent, such as titlepage.doc, I can open with no problem. Is there anything I can do to open these? -- Daiya Mitchell, MVP Mac/Word Word FAQ: http://www.word.mvps.org/ MacWord Tips: http://www.word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/ What's an MVP? A volunteer! Read the FAQ: http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/ |
#5
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I think Daiya hit it on the head when she said:
you shouldn't use periods in filenames *except* for extensions, it confuses the computers. Try an underscore or simple capitalization instead--e.g. MitchellChapter7Final.doc. In otherwords, you've got too many dots in your file names. There should only be one (right before the extension) when opening them in Windows. "Daiya Mitchell" wrote: If you emailed them from the Mac to the Windows machine, the problem may be attachment encoding, but that's not fixable if you already deleted them on the Mac machine. Suzanne pretty much said this, but did you specifically try using File | Open in Word and navigate to the files? It that doesn't work, you may at least be able to use File | Open with type set to Recover Text from Any File to recover the basic text. For future reference, investigate flash drives. And note that you shouldn't use periods in filenames *except* for extensions, it confuses the computers. Try an underscore or simple capitalization instead--e.g. MitchellChapter7Final.doc. If on the Mac, you only moved them to the trash, they may still be in the trash and resending them might help--preferably control-click on the Mac and Create Archive to save them as .zip files which are less likely to get corrupted in transit. And check the attachment encoding: There's no difference in the Word file format (since Word 97), it's a question of how the attachment is encoded by the email program. A Mac email program, Entourage, has this to say in Help: About attachment encodings When you choose an encoding format, it is helpful to understand how Macintosh files differ from files created on other computers. Macintosh files include additional resource information that files created on other types of computers do not. If you are sending a data file, such as a Microsoft Word document or Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, such resource information may not be necessary. However, if you are sending something more complex, such as a program, to another Macintosh computer, you must choose an encoding format that preserves all the data. The AppleDouble encoding format preserves the additional resource information, and can be read by both Macintosh and other types of computers. AppleDouble is a good choice for your default encoding format; it works most of the time with most computers. However, if AppleDouble fails, you can choose a different encoding format depending on the type of computer you are sending the attachment to: ‚¬ To send an attachment to a Macintosh computer, use BinHex, which preserves the Macintosh resource information and data. ‚¬ To send an attachment to a Windows-based computer, use MIME/Base 64, which preserves the data only. ‚¬ To send an attachment to a UNIX computer, use UUEncode, which preserves the data only. Try sending this explanation to your correspondent, asking them to change their encoding. The help on any Mac email program will tell them how. If you see something about "application/x-macbinary" when trying to open the doc, sounds like they encoded it for Mac computers. DM Mac MVP for Word On 1/5/05 4:55 PM, "vic" wrote: I can't open several chapters of my dissertation, this is a crisis. I was working on a Mac, OS X. Don't know which version of Word, but recent. I am at home with my PC, Windows XP. I sent myself, then deleted, several chapters that were named like this: myname.chapter7.final Now I have a bunch of attachments that I can't open. They give me gibberish. I went in and added the extension ".doc" but it doesn't make any difference, still garbage. A few files I sent, such as titlepage.doc, I can open with no problem. Is there anything I can do to open these? -- Daiya Mitchell, MVP Mac/Word Word FAQ: http://www.word.mvps.org/ MacWord Tips: http://www.word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/ What's an MVP? A volunteer! Read the FAQ: http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/ |
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