Hello Glenn:
On Mon, 7 May 2001 01:53:02 -0400 (EDT), Glenn Gilbreath, Jr. wrote:
> Sam,
> As best I can remember, AOL email will send files to other email services as
> RFC attachments. IIRC, this only signifies it conforms to RFC standards.
> Just save the file as a plain text file...in Arachne press F2, then either
> "view as plain text" or save as plain text. AOL always has been a bit
> different from other email services...I should know, I've been on AOL for
> some 5 years now, hehe! Another quirk with AOL is hyperlinks embedded in
> received emails...most only show up as the web site address or whatever.
> Something with the style of "quoting" that AOL uses...just another reason I
> call it AOHell!
> Hope this clears you up a bit and not muddy everything!
The RFC attachments are indeed being sent by an AOL user. Of course I
experienced no problem in saving the CNM files and then viewing them as
plain text. I just wondered why anyone would send plain text attachments
with such strange filename extensions. The average computer user on the
receiving end would not immediately recognize the file type. Maybe
something should be modified in MIME.CFG to make it a little easier for us
to deal with RFC attachments.
BTW, I think it is required of all file attachments of any type to be sent
as email to be in conformity with RFC standards. Otherwise they would not
even make it through the system. Such is my understanding. Therefore, it
is not at all helpful for the person receiving the attachment to know that
it conforms to RFC standards. If the attachment had a TXT, DOC, FAQ, HTM,
UUE, or some other well known extension, then the person receiving it would
at least have some clue as to what he needs to do to in order to view the
file. Simply knowing that the attachment conforms to RFC standards is of
no help whatsoever. Another problem that the AOL people have is that they
don't seem to know the right way to forward an attachment, such as joke,
which they had received as a forwarded attachment from some other AOL user
who had received it as a forwarded attachment, a la almost ad infinitim
regression. In order to read the joke I find myself clicking on ikon after
ikon until I finally get down to the one that reveals the joke. By this
time it isn't even funny anymore. What a waste of bandwidth, and what a
mad hassle! Why do the AOL people have such strange ways of doing things?
Isn't there something the AOL users could do at their end to fix the
problems? Maybe they could, but they don't know how. I have the feeling
that AOL attracts the most novice and inexperienced computer users. After
they gain some more knowledge they tend to move on to a better service. I
don't think that AOL succeeds in retaining many of their customers over a
very lengthy period. There must be something terribly screwed up with the
AOL service. Were it not so, they would be able to keep most of their
customers.
Regards,
Sam Heywood
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