How to Open an E-mail Attachment

These are general directions for opening an attachment. You can receive attachments in many different formats, and you can use many different e-mail programs to open them.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Floppy Disks
• Computer Desks
• Internet Access
• E-mail Accounts
• Computers
• E-mail Software

1. Open your e-mail program.
2. Open the e-mail message with the attachment.
3. Double-click the attachment icon.
4. Choose "Open it" or "Save to disk," and then click OK to either view the file right there or save it onto your hard drive or a floppy disk.

Tips & Warnings

• With some e-mail programs, you can drag the attachment icon from the message to your desktop to save it, and then open it from there.
• Some e-mail programs show certain types of attachments without even having to open them.
• America Online does not read MIME attachments.
• If you can't open a file by double-clicking on it, try launching a program you think might open it, and then use the Open command in that program. If that doesn't work, ask the sender of the file to resend the attachment in a file format you can use. For word-processing documents, the RTF format can be read by most applications, and it preserves formatting. Plain, or ASCII, text can be read by almost any program, but all formatting is lost.
• Make sure your virus program is up to date, and be careful what you open, because attachments can contain viruses. Don't open attachments that are forwarded to you unless you know the person who sent them, and also the person from whom that person received them. Be especially careful opening files that end in .exe. These files are applications, and they are more likely to carry viruses that can affect your whole computer.