Attachments galore

11 Apr 2010 22:36:28

Alan Cox

I have sent my brother – who uses a Windows PC with Outlook Express – a text file done in Pages and sent as a Word attachment to an email sent by my Mail. He can read the text file OK but also gets a number of other attachments which he cannot open and read. As I understand it, these extra attachments are bits and pieces that Pages likes to send along for the ride because they represent its ability to do extras such as inserting shapes, tables, photos etc etc. So I thought I would try a text file done in Open Office and exported as a Word document. He received this in good order but, and I quote: "I got another attachment with the Internet Explorer icon called ATT0007.htm(207B). On opening this you get a completely blank screen (apart from the taskbars etc at the top) . Apple seems to do this with all the attachments sent to PCs and I have got used to it, but others may find it a bit odd and wonder if they are missing out." He thinks it may be a Notepad file.

Can anyone explain these annoyances and how to avoid them? They give Apple a bad reputation

Re: Attachments galore

12 Apr 2010 08:42:37

Douglas Cheney

Hi Alan, I always send anything as a PDF file to my my family and friends they don't have any trouble opening them

Re: Attachments galore

12 Apr 2010 09:28:22

Trevor Hewson

I hoped that someone more expert would answer this but I have always understood that the extra attachment that often arrives when sending jpg files to PC users was something called a Resource Fork (although that was pre-OSX so that terminology may no longer apply!). It contains data used by Macs to enable the file's icon to be displayed nicely etc., and has no meaning to PCs. I don't know whether your extra Pages attachments are similar. I try to remember to tell PC recipients how many attachments I am sending and to ignore any extra small files that may appear.

As for how to avoid the problem, I can't help much. In the case of .jpgs I think the problem can be avoided by using the 'save for web' option in Photoshop Elements and I would have hoped that selecting a PC-specific file format in a Save As dialogue would also take care of it but your experience suggests otherwise.

Re: Attachments galore

13 Apr 2010 11:55:00

Euan Williams

Hi Alan,
complexities on complexity? Let's try the KISS principle (aka. William of Occam's historic Razor).

Your brother doesn't need text exported from Pages in Word format, the 'followers' he is finding result from that. Here is a review of the issue.

Doug is right that print to .pdf is the best possible solution to preserving the look and feel of a page (from which text is generally selectable so that it can be copied, although some editing may be required to remove neighbouring column stuff, etc.)

PDF's are a great solution, provided you remember that Apple's .pdfs are aimed at doing just that, and pics will be heavily compressed. Pages 'exports' to Word, .rtf and text. In high end print layout programmes, files are also 'exported' to .pdf before being sent to 'direct to plate' (no film) workflows at printers. However these can vary from basic .pdfs for web and email via inkjet print to huge pre-press .pdfs with a serious amount of extra digital info and resolution. In between are a variety of other .pdf formats, "pdf X1-a" etc.

Trevor is right too, with the caveat that .jpgs saved for web are generally rather tiny and have much of the detail compressed out of them, so take care. If your ISP allows the heavier data traffic, and they don't suddenly fill your email box right up to blockage, you can send any .jpg to any system and it should have no 'followers' floating around.

So, for sending text there are:
1. Plain Text files -- .txt (e.g. SimpleText on pre-OSX Macs): Monaco monospaced font on Mac, virtually no formatting, no pics.
2. Rich Text formatting -- .rtf (TextEdit native format) text with tabs etc.
3. Rich Text with Attachments -- .rtfd (rich text with images)
4. Pasted into email text (with suitable marking) plus separate pics.

Note: for fonts to layout properly, an equivalent font should be available on the PC, but even fonts with the same name (eg. Garamond -regular) may offer uncertain layout results depending on the Foundry and other technical thingies -- which brings us back to Apple .pdfs.

(1) If NOT using "Pages" export, you might need to copy your text into TextEdit first. Within Text Edit, this can be made by choosing 'Make plain text' from the Format menu in TextEdit
(2 and 3) are in varying senses compatible with MS Office (layout and fonts may go phut).
(4) is simple to do and use.

TexEdit offers a range of other choices too, some of which may produce 'followers'.
===
web page (html)
web archive
===
OpenDocument Text (.odt)
===
Word 2007 Format (.docx)
Word 2003 Format (.xml)
Word 97 Format (.doc)

Virtually everything will open Word 97 format (.doc)
Absolutely anything will open Simple text files (.txt)
Text copied into the body of an email becomes part of that universal format.

And that (as Jervis would write) is it, isn't it?
Hope this helps summarise things,
Euan.

Re: Attachments galore

13 Apr 2010 21:54:50

Alan Cox

Thanks for all that folks. This old brain of mine will take a little while to assimilate all those words of advice and wisdom. And then I will be able to post a knowledgeable thank you. Meanwhile is there a keyboard short cut to change from upper to lower case letters?

Re: Attachments galore

14 Apr 2010 11:27:57

Euan Williams

Hi Alan,
almost all word processors have options to do this, but assuming you are in another kind of programme, then this is a make-do answer.

Paste the text (say, all-caps) into TextEdit, select it, choose Edit > Transformations and choose 'Make Lower Case' -- or vice versa. 'Capitalize' changes the first letters of all words to upper case.

Here's the fun bit:
1. go to System prefs > Keyboard > Keyboard shortcuts.
2. In the left column choose Application Shortcuts
3. Click on the + sign
4. choose Application > Text Edit
5. type in the exact menu command you want to "shortcut" eg. 'Make Lower Case'
6. carefully choose a memorable, but unused shortcut eg. Cmnd-l (for Lower) -- cmnd-u for uppercase
-- BUT NOT cmnd-c for Capitals ;-)

Try this for all three menu items. You can always click the minus key to remove it or Restore Defaults, but that may be global. across all Apps.
Hope this meets the need at least partially,
Euan.

Re: Attachments galore

14 Apr 2010 22:34:06

Alan Cox

Gee, Euan, having read it twice I am pretty certain I have got the hang of your ingenious 'work around'. I will have a go tomorrow unless someone can tell me that there is already a menu item somewhere in Pages '08 (v. 3.0.3) to change upper to lower case letters and vice versa. I've just spent an hour looking and failed to find it.

I'm almost home and dry on the extra attachments that PCs add to the all important intended attachment. I shall do some tests with my brother as the guinea pig.

Re: Attachments galore

15 Apr 2010 08:55:41

Euan Williams

Hi Alan,
in Pages '09 v 4.0.3 it's here:

Format > Font > Capitalization.

The same method of making shortcuts applies -- and is probably present in Pages '08 too.

Since Apple uses all sorts of common Unixy code across related software, what works in one situation frequently woks in other related ones.

Extra attachments: if these appear on your Brother's PC you are probably not keeping it simple enough. The days when attached Apple files were inevitably sprayed across PC screens are long gone -- at least from my Mac!

HTH,
Euan.

Re: Attachments galore

15 Apr 2010 09:43:22

Eleanor Spenceley

Hi Alan

'Can anyone explain these annoyances and how to avoid them? They give Apple a bad reputation'

May I redirect you to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outlook_Express look under Criticism. Outlook is the problem since it uses it's own 'proprietary e-mail attachment format' standard. No doubt this is Microsoft's way of 'embracing and extending' it's monopoly on what should have been a simple standard.

You could suggest to your brother to choose a more 'standard' email Application and not live in the Microsoft hegemony too readily ;-)
Mozilla's Thunderbird is supposed to be a nice (free) email client: http://www.mozillamessaging.com/en-US/thunderbird/

Failing that...

I find if you send email attachments 'inline/embedded', crappy Outlook will take all your text after the first attachment, and make them as attachments in their own right and you'll get spurious extra attachments in Outlook. These are not to be confused with 'resource forks' since Mac OS X has long abandoned these things.

Two things you should do:

1) Make sure all your attachments are placed at the _very_ end of your email
2) When attaching attachments make sure you 'manually' attach them via the 'Attach' icon in your email composing window.
Also be sure to select the 'Send Windows-Friendly Attachments' option before attaching your file.

Re: Attachments galore

9 May 2010 23:11:53

Alan Cox

Thanks for that Martin. I shall be sure to follow your advice about sending attachments which I have done only erratically in the past. My brother tells me that he is actually using 'Outlook' and not 'Outlook Express'. Apparently "Outlook' is a newer Microsoft mail client and I don't know anything about it.
And thank you to Euan about changing case (eg. upper to lower case). I found your work around rather tricky by which I mean I couldn't make it work but that just reflects my incompetence. I downloaded a trial version of Pages '09 v 4.0.3 and regretfully have to say that the Font>Capitalisation does not actually enable change of all capitals to all lower case. In fact, it is much the same as in Pages '08 and is pretty useless. I tremble to disagree with Euan and will now take a double brandy.

Re: Attachments galore

11 May 2010 11:18:07

Euan Williams

Aah hah! To reassure Alan in his dilemma (and reduce the brandy bill):

Quite right, Alan. You have found a bug / "feature" in the font > capitalisation setup in Pages.

It all works fine if you originally typed your words in all lower case. But if you have inadvertently pressed caps lock, or have used the shift key for title capitalisation it doesn't -- for those letters, in Pages. Pity, as unintended caps lock 'on' is usually when we need to change things. Perhaps Apple will fix this.

Going back to the 'work around' via TeachText: I should have suggested cmnd+opt+[letter] which is what I actually use. My "new" menu items are to be found in Edit > transformations. Capitalize is the same as 'Titling' in Pages -- the first letter of each word is changed to upper case.

Remember the motto: "No one knows everything, and no one knows nothing" !
Good luck, Euan

Re: Attachments galore

12 May 2010 12:25:46

Eleanor Spenceley

Hi Alan,

Whether it is Outlook or Outlook Express I believe my statement on Outlook still stands. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Outlook#Internet_standards_compliance