Missing attachments - winmail.dat instead

Email received from a sender using Outlook includes a Winmail.dat attachment

I'll ask the moderators to move your question to the proper forum.

Winmail.dat files are attachments sent by Microsoft mail applications (Outlook, Outlook Express or Exchange) on a proprietary format called TNEF (transport neutral encapsulation format). Being a non-standard attachment format, users from other e-mail clients (like Thunderbird or Foxmail) cannot natively read them.

But Enolsoft Winmail Viewer can help Mac users open it.

this is BS! Stop telling me it is an outlook problem! The only thing that has changed is my Mac being updated to Mavericks.

This is an Outlook problem and/or an Exchange Server problem.

The Mail.app with Mavericks or with any email client can't drop or replace the attachment type received.

I still call BS. Not necessarily on you but on Apple.

Why should I have to download another app, Letter Opener, or WinDat Opener from Mac store??

I downloaded Letter Opener and now I can open the file no problem. But I shouldn't have to buy a $25 app to make this work.

BS Apple! BS.

Because this is garbage from Outlook and/or the Exchange Server the email originates from that Microslop has known about for years and refuses to do anything about.

You need to take your complaint up with Microsoft. Why do they continue to use a proprietary format to send attachments via their email clients and Exchange Server?

I agree. But both of these clown companies know what is going on. I've been migrating over to my mac book pro for about a year. Been putting it off mostly because I don't know enough about macs. but the more i use it the more i like it. except for little stuff like this. Which combined with iCloud not working properly (another gut wrenching issue that is now upgraded in support to the engineers) is driving me nuts.

Just make it work guys! Play nice. Or maybe play smarter. Obviously someone knows about the issue, Letter Opener, so apple should just figure it out. Be the bigger person and solve problems for millions of people. I can't go back to every outlook user and ask them to change their email sending habits. Most of them don't even know what they are doing. The smart people who write the code need to figure it out.

Microsoft is using a proprietary format. They could choose to use an open standard format instead but don't. Microsoft needs to figure it out.

Winmail.dat files should NEVER make it outside the Microsoft environment. Whenever they do it is usually due to some misconfiguration in an Exchange/Outlook server. This is a an old well-known problem.

Ok, I did a little experiment. I am on a MBP that dual boots. I have Outlook 2011 on the Mac (Mavericks) side and Outlook 2010 on the Windows (7 Pro) side.

Both Outlooks are going through our office Exchange Server 2010.

If I send an email with a jpeg attachment to my wife's Mac using Mavericks she gets the attachment as a windat file.

If I send an email with a jpeg attachment to my wife's Mac using Windows 7 Pro she get the attachment as it was sent (jpeg).

Anyone care to explain why?

Thanks

I ended up just buying Letter Opener pro for the Mac out of frustration.

Works great so far.

That's one problem solved.

Now if anyone can figure out why half my recipients of a calendar invite don't receive it that would be great. Most of those not receiving it are probably using outlook, but some gmail users aren't receiving it either.

I agree this is a mac issue.

I use Mac Mail to access my gmail account. The attachment comes through fine on the browser gmail client but not on the desktop mac mail client. This indicates that google mail is able to translate the attachment but mac mail cannot.