How to read TNEF attachments?

What is a MS-TNEF mail attachment ?

Ms-TNEF is a MIME type contains Microsoft's rich text format information which is a proprietary standard from Microsoft. The MS-TNEF is usually generated by Microsoft's mail client such as Microsoft Outlook or Exchange Mail. The format encodes the attributes of messages such as fonts, colour of fonts, type face of fonts etc. It is that the file format to the original email. Besides, it may or may not contain other file attachment information. For example, TNEF attachment may contain a Microsoft Word document or Excel worksheet.

Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express in different versions are typical mail clients that may generate a MS-TNEF attachment to outgoing mail if the Microsoft Outlook Rich Text format is enabled. Mail client such as Netscape Messenger will notice that a file with name winmail.dat is attached to the received email.

How to read MS-TNEF mail attachment ?

To view MS-TNEF attachment in Netscape Messenger, user will need to install a MS-TNEF helper application first. There is a free MS-TNEF helper application called "Fentun" available in the internet. Please follow the steps below to download and install this free software. 

SETUP an MS-TNEF helper application - Fentun :

• Step 1 : Download Fentun

A helper application is needed for the decoding of MS-TNEF attachment. You may download one of such application called "Fentun" from the "Download for Windows 95" section from the following web page,

http://www.fentun.com/

and save it to an appropriate place on your harddrive. For example you may save it to the following location on your PC:

C:\Program Files\Fentun\fentun.exe

• Step 2 : Setup Fentun as a file type in Win95/Win98

You have to set up the application properties first to the Win95/Win98 file type section to make Fentun work properly. Please input as following :

1. Right click on the "start" button on the Desktop (it is usually located at the left bottom corner) and select "Explore" option.
2. Click on "View" tab and select the "Options..." option for Win95; "Folder options..." option for Win98.
3. Select the "File types" tab.
4. Click on the "New type..." tab to define a new type for "Fentun".

Input the followings to the appropriate table :

1. Description of type : Microsoft Ms-TNEF Format
2. Associated extension: dat (If the extension dat is used by other application, you may enter tnf here. However, you need to save to a file with extension tnf when the file winmail.dat (For example it is saved as C:\winmail.tnf) later invoked by Netscape and ask you to "open it / save to a file")
3. Content type (MIME) :application/ms-tnef
4. Click "New..." from "Actions". Input "open" in "Action" window and input "C:\Program Files\Fentun\Fentun.exe" "%1" in "Application used to perform action:" window. (It is the place you saved fentun.exe from download in step1)
5. Click "OK" several times to finish the file type setup.

 

How do I use Fentun for Netscape Messenger ?

When you read an email that contains an attachment file named "winmail.dat" from Netscape Messenger, it is probably an MS-TNEF format attachment.

You first click on the file "winmail.dat". Then the system will prompt you to select between "open it / save to a file". You may select "open it" if you have defined the "dat" as the extension in the "file types" definition in step 2 point 4b. Otherwise, please choose "save to a file" and read it externally if you input another extension name to the "file types" definition.

How to read the saved file externally ?

Right click on the "Start" button from the Windows Desktop and select the "Run..." option. Then input the location of  "Fentun" and the path of the saved attachment file and select "OK" to run. 

Here is an example : "C:\Program Files\Fentun\fentun.exe" "C:\winmail.tnf" 

What does Fentun look like ?

As seen from above, a file called "test.doc" is contained in the attachment file "winmail.dat". You may select the file and saves it in your hard drive. An appropriate application may be needed to read your saved file. For example, a "doc" file may require Microsoft Word to read.

You will see nothing on the selection window if the attachment file "winmail.dat" contains only the file format of the original email.