Body of email sent as .txt attachment

Question

Body of email sent as .txt attachment

For some reason, whenever I start an email with an attachment (by dragging the Finder icon of the file onto the dock icon of Mail), the body of my email gets turned into a text file attachment with the name such as ATT0001.txt. Is there any way to revert Mail's behavior so the body of my email remains visible as text and the attachment is sent as an attachment?

Intel iMac 2.66 MHz Dual Core 2, Mac OS X (10.6.2), and sometimes MacPro or MacBook Pro

Posted on Jan 20, 2010 4:31 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Barney-15E

Level 10

122,942 points

Jan 20, 2010 4:47 AM in response to David M. Fresco

Are you talking about while composing, or when the recipient reads it?

If the latter, it is not being sent as a text attachment. Outlook has a huge issue with being able to interpret anything but its own email.

You can send as plain text only. You can also go to Edit>Attachments and set Always send windows friendly attachments and Always insert attachments at end of message.

If you want to send a rich text message, start off by changing the font to something other than your default font. This seems to get Outlook to recognize that it is multipart message and puts everything together correctly.

There are several posts related to sending email to windows computers. Use more options to search All messages and you'll find a lot of posts on the topic.

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Answer 2

Jan 20, 2010 5:28 AM in response to Rude_Dog

As suggested by Barney-15, so far, selecting the option from the Edit ->Attachment menu to put the attachment at the end of the email has fixed the problem, at least when I send it to myself. Still, not sure how and when Mail's behavior changed.

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Answer 3

bg1999

Level 1

44 points

Jan 23, 2010 6:12 PM in response to Barney-15E

I agree that the attachment has to be placed at the end of the message. You can just drag it inside the compose window and place it at the bottom of the message.

I've had the same experience you described and this was the only way I found to resolve it. It does render ok when the receiver gets his new message from you.

bg

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Answer 4

Feb 25, 2010 6:39 AM in response to David M. Fresco

The above did not fix the problem of reply or forwarded emails getting sent as a ,txt attachment. This is how I resolved it. Go to Preferences > Signatures. Select signature, check the box always match my default font, and uncheck place signature above quoted text. Voila, attachments are now going in the body of the email instead of as a .txt file.

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Answer 5

Jan 20, 2010 4:48 AM in response to David M. Fresco

Seems like if the attachment is in the body of the email prior to any and all the text then the remaining text gets sent as an attachment. Mail never behaved this way before. Any ideas how to make it behave in the old manner?

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Answer 6

Jan 20, 2010 4:51 AM in response to Barney-15E

Thanks for the reply. I mean that it looks that way when I look in my Sent folder. Also, I systematically sent myself a few emails with attachments to my gmail account. As I said in an earlier reply, the body of the email came through as an attachment when the attachment was at the top of the window. I will try the option of placing the attachment at the end.

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Answer 7

Rude_Dog

Level 1

85 points

Jan 20, 2010 5:16 AM in response to David M. Fresco

I have the same "problem", even if I start a message by typing text then clicking on the "paperclip" to navigate to the attachment on my HD - the attachment is shown in the body of the message.

If you find a solution, be sure to share 😉

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Answer 8

sadie1

Level 1

4 points

Feb 19, 2010 9:54 AM in response to David M. Fresco

i dont want the attachment in the text of the message anywhere, just want an icon. is that possible to do? i have checked aways send as windows and always at the end of the mesage. but i dot wat the attachment in the message anywhere, Thanks, if anne has a solution.

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Answer 9

Rude_Dog

Level 1

85 points

Jan 20, 2010 5:39 AM in response to David M. Fresco

It changed with upgrading to SL - for me.

Also, what has this issue to do with Outlook ?

Message was edited by: Rude_Dog

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Answer 10

Jan 20, 2010 5:40 AM in response to Rude_Dog

I've been using Snow Leopard since Sept 2009. This issue just arose for me. Don't know the connection to Outlook. I did not bring up Outlook.

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Answer 11

Barney-15E

Level 10

122,942 points

Jan 20, 2010 3:27 PM in response to Rude_Dog

Outlook is the primary email client that cannot handle the email sent by Mail. Other standards compliant email clients have no problem with email sent by Mail.

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