Outlook 2007 eml attachment problem

M

Mamba

Hi,

I'm trying to figure out why a forwarded .eml attachment (sent from
Thunderbird, containing email txt) is incomplete when opened in
Outlook 2007. Mail store is iPlanet IMAP. The fwd'd mail and
attachment from Tbird is HTML format.
It appears that when Outlook pulls down the attachment it converts it
to .msg format and truncates all of the inline quoted text, leaving
only the last non-quoted part of the message.
I've tried various "text only" settings in both Tbird and Outlook but
the fwd'd attachment already contains HTML and I don't think those
apply to it.
The only work-around I have thus far would be to ask the senders to
Reply (changing the To: to my address) instead of Fwd from Tbird since
then Tbird places the attached email contents inline. But that's a
poor solution.

TIA,
 
D

Diane Poremsky [MVP]

Are you running a virus scanner on inbound mail? If so, disable it.

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]



Outlook Tips by email:
(e-mail address removed)

EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point your
newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.
 
M

Mamba

Thanks Diane, but I already tried disabling the Mcafee Desktop AV...no
difference.

Cheers,

M

'Diane Poremsky [MVP said:
;260831']Are you running a virus scanner on inbound mail? If so, disable
it.

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]



Outlook Tips by email:
(e-mail address removed)

EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
(e-mail address removed)

You can access this newsgroup by visiting
http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx or point
your
newsreader to msnews.microsoft.com.


"Mamba" (e-mail address removed) wrote in message

Hi,

I'm trying to figure out why a forwarded .eml attachment (sent from
Thunderbird, containing email txt) is incomplete when opened in
Outlook 2007. Mail store is iPlanet IMAP. The fwd'd mail and
attachment from Tbird is HTML format.
It appears that when Outlook pulls down the attachment it converts it
to .msg format and truncates all of the inline quoted text, leaving
only the last non-quoted part of the message.
I've tried various "text only" settings in both Tbird and Outlook but
the fwd'd attachment already contains HTML and I don't think those
apply to it.
The only work-around I have thus far would be to ask the senders to
Reply (changing the To: to my address) instead of Fwd from Tbird
since
then Tbird places the attached email contents inline. But that's a
poor solution.

TIA,

M
 
B

Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]

I already tried disabling the Mcafee Desktop AV...no difference.

In the case of many AV programs, it is not enough to disable it. You must
uninstall it and then reinstall it without the mail scanning feature.
 
M

Mamba

I'll give that a try and report.

TIA,

M

'Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook said:
;261133']"Mamba" (e-mail address removed) wrote in message
-
I already tried disabling the Mcafee Desktop AV...no difference.-

In the case of many AV programs, it is not enough to disable it. You
must
uninstall it and then reinstall it without the mail scanning feature.
 
M

Mamba

Brian, I completely uninstalled the Mcafee AV and rebooted. Sam
problem. Open the email in Tbird and the inline quote text is there
Open the same message in Outlook '07 and I get an attachment whic
doesn't contain the inline quote text.
I've also tried setting the "Read all standard mail in plain text
option in the Trust Center...no difference.

:-(


'Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook said:
;261133']"Mamba" (e-mail address removed) wrote in message
-
I already tried disabling the Mcafee Desktop AV...no difference.-

In the case of many AV programs, it is not enough to disable it. Yo
must
uninstall it and then reinstall it without the mail scanning feature.
 
B

Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]

Brian, I completely uninstalled the Mcafee AV and rebooted. Same
problem. Open the email in Tbird and the inline quote text is there.
Open the same message in Outlook '07 and I get an attachment which
doesn't contain the inline quote text.
I've also tried setting the "Read all standard mail in plain text"
option in the Trust Center...no difference.

Messages you've already received won't be corrected, but new messages should
not suffer the same problem.
 
M

Mamba

Hi Brian,

I've done a lot of testing and the client AV is NOT a factor. Which is
a good thing since the AV email scanning isn't something we'd want to
disable. I'd have to check to see if any server-side scanning is in
place (separate department) but if it is, turning it off won't be an
option I'm sure.

Again, it's the "Reply to" message content which retains integrity.
It's the "Forward to" messages that lose the quoted content when viewed
via Outlook, since the earlier message content becomes an .eml
attachment.
In Thunderbird or the web client (iPlanet Messenger Express) both types
of messages display all content. So it appears that Outlook is
truncating the attachment. I also noticed disparate sizes being
reported by Outlook on the attachment name, like so:

Fwd_ Re_ class.newcampaigns GSIP Quick Summary.eml (10.4 KB) (20KB)

Not sure if ^this is indicative of the problem.

For grins, I tried Outlook Express 6. I assume this would also be
subject to the desktop AV scanning (which is enabled) but maybe not.

Again, the "Reply to" message content is all intact.
The "Forward to" message has a similar attachment that looks like:
Fwd_ Re_ class.newcampaigns GSIP Quick Summary.eml (10.4 KB)

When I open ^this I get a blank email with yet another attachment:
class.newcampaigns GSIP Quick Summary (9.62 KB)

Then when I open ^this I get the full message contents with all the
quoted content. Sure looks to me like I'm losing that 9.62 KB of text
with Outlook 2007, but where??

Tx,

M

'Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook said:
;261995']"Mamba" (e-mail address removed) wrote in message
-
Brian, I completely uninstalled the Mcafee AV and rebooted. Same
problem. Open the email in Tbird and the inline quote text is there.
Open the same message in Outlook '07 and I get an attachment which
doesn't contain the inline quote text.
I've also tried setting the "Read all standard mail in plain text"
option in the Trust Center...no difference.-

Messages you've already received won't be corrected, but new messages
should
not suffer the same problem.
 
B

Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]

I've done a lot of testing and the client AV is NOT a factor. Which is
a good thing since the AV email scanning isn't something we'd want to
disable.

Why, when there is no technical reason in the world to have it enabled? It
does NOT add to your safety and DOES interfere with Outlook operation.
Again, it's the "Reply to" message content which retains integrity.
It's the "Forward to" messages that lose the quoted content when viewed
via Outlook, since the earlier message content becomes an .eml
attachment.

In Thunderbird or the web client (iPlanet Messenger Express) both types
of messages display all content. So it appears that Outlook is
truncating the attachment.

No, it appears that whatever generates the EML attachment is doing so in
such a way that Outlook cannot decode it properly.
For grins, I tried Outlook Express 6. I assume this would also be
subject to the desktop AV scanning (which is enabled) but maybe not.

It's possible that since the AV plug-in for OE and for Outlook are
different, one might interfere while the other doesn't. It's also possible
OE isn't as sensitive to the interference. Keep the integration if you
wish, but when you have trouble, the first thing you should so is eliminate
variables and uninstalling the AV (temporarily) at least, is warranted.
Again, the "Reply to" message content is all intact.
The "Forward to" message has a similar attachment that looks like:
Fwd_ Re_ class.newcampaigns GSIP Quick Summary.eml (10.4 KB)

When I open ^this I get a blank email with yet another attachment:
class.newcampaigns GSIP Quick Summary (9.62 KB)

Then when I open ^this I get the full message contents with all the
quoted content. Sure looks to me like I'm losing that 9.62 KB of text
with Outlook 2007, but where??

Now you have confirmation that it is the message itself that is malformed,
despite being viewable with Thunderbird. Clearly if OE has trouble as well;
it's the message content that is in error. It would be interesting to see
the raw message content. I suspect header malformation that is ignored by
Thunderbird or the web browser.
 
M

Mamba

'Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook said:
;262563']...
Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook] wrote:
-
Why, when there is no technical reason in the world to have it (the AV)
enabled? It does NOT add to your safety and DOES interfere with Outlook
operation.
-
Must disagree there. I've tested with/without the AV email scan enabled
using the EICAR test virus. If enabled, the virus, even with a changed
"acceptable" extension like .zip, gets nuked by the email AV scan and
notifies within Outlook:
Attachment file : eicar.com.zip
Scanner Detected: EICAR test file (Test)
Action taken : Moved (Clean failed because the detection isn't
cleanable)

In my book ^that definitely IS adding to the safety factor.
Without the AV enabled Outlook will happily let you
save/open/forward/whatever the message, relying on your desktop AV
real-time to catch any bugs.

As for the "DOES interfere with Outlook operation" I've already tested,
on a new incoming forwarded message, with NO AV at all, and with the
email AV disabled and with it removed; the problem remains.
-
No, it appears that whatever generates the EML attachment is doing so
in
such a way that Outlook cannot decode it properly.
-
That I can buy.
-
It's possible that since the AV plug-in for OE and for Outlook are
different, one might interfere while the other doesn't. It's also
possible
OE isn't as sensitive to the interference.
-
In the EICAR test, the email AV scan did not work with OE. I'd say it's
specific to Outlook.
-
Clearly if OE has trouble as well; it's the message content that is in
error. It would be interesting to see the raw message content. I
suspect header malformation that is ignored by Thunderbird or the web
browser.
-
While OE had "trouble" it still worked in acceptable fashion. It showed
me attachments that, tho' nested, I could open and get to all the
original message content. Which to me means that while not perfect, the
IMAP support in OE is still better than in Outlook '07, if not as good
as non-MS products. Unfortunately using OE isn't an option.

Tx,

M
 
B

Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]

Must disagree there. I've tested with/without the AV email scan enabled
using the EICAR test virus. If enabled, the virus, even with a changed
"acceptable" extension like .zip, gets nuked by the email AV scan and
notifies within Outlook:
Attachment file : eicar.com.zip
Scanner Detected: EICAR test file (Test)
Action taken : Moved (Clean failed because the detection isn't
cleanable)

In my book ^that definitely IS adding to the safety factor.
Without the AV enabled Outlook will happily let you
save/open/forward/whatever the message, relying on your desktop AV
real-time to catch any bugs.

Exactly my point. The real-time/on-access scanner will catch it. You're
not more protected as you yourself have just described. The infection is
simply caught at a different point in the process. Who'd be foolish enough
to forward a zip file that you weren't 100% sure about?
As for the "DOES interfere with Outlook operation" I've already tested,
on a new incoming forwarded message, with NO AV at all, and with the
email AV disabled and with it removed; the problem remains.

Well, then, in your case, the AV program wasn't the problem, but that
doesn't mean that it's NEVER a problem as a simple perusal of this newsgroup
would prove.
In the EICAR test, the email AV scan did not work with OE. I'd say it's
specific to Outlook.

No, it's specific to the scanner that integrates with either Outlook or
Outlook Express.
While OE had "trouble" it still worked in acceptable fashion. It showed
me attachments that, tho' nested, I could open and get to all the
original message content. Which to me means that while not perfect, the
IMAP support in OE is still better than in Outlook '07, if not as good
as non-MS products. Unfortunately using OE isn't an option.

I'll not argue here. IMAP in Outlook has never been the most effective
transport.
 

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