.eml attachments
 

I have read these forums and have seen othe posts regarding .eml attachments but I have not found a resolution to my problem. I use gmail in my web browser only. I do not use a email client like outlook etc.... I get many emails and at the bottom there is an attachment with .eml extension. How can I read these emails in my browser without an email client? thanks.

marioval,

Welcome to the EMD forums. EML file is a proprietary Outlook Express format. Only OE can read the file.

You can use Thunderbird also, if that's your default client. Or you can download the attachment and view it with any text editor, eml files are just text files. Although if there is an attachment within the attached eml file, you'll need a client such as Outlook Express or Thunderbird to view/save the attachments (or another utility).

-Jim

That's what I thought -- that they're just text files, that is. As such, I'm a little surprised Gmail doesn't have the option to open them in a browser window as it does with some other attachment types (PDF files being the only one that comes to mind at the moment Oh yes, and Powerpoint files, I believe -- what are they, PPS, I think?) But since I don't think I ever receive EML files, it wasn't easy to check that for myself. In fact, since I'm pretty sure I've used webmail services in the past which did allow me to open EML attachments in my browser, I'm a little surprised Gmail doesn't.

Try to click "View". If your browser associate .eml files with text files, it should open just fine.

Actually it is the most standard way to have email. You cannot have it less proprietary than this format. eml is just the file extension Windows associates with the MIME Content-Type message/rfc822, which is the standard internet format for email. However viewing it as text means anything encoded (in the way email standards define) might not be readable by a human. Gmail shows me an eml attachment as text, and it should show it as a message (FastMail does it this way. Popular desktop email clients do it. I think major webmail systems automatically shows them inline).

So the way to have them readable in Gmail is probably to send a bug report (or feature request) and wait a few months...

The point is that Gmail cannot read the email now. So you need to Outlook Express or Thundbird with an extension.

Thanks for all the info. I hate email clients which is why I choose to use web interface only. I know there are benefits to a client like compatability and offline viewing but my life is not so internet dependent where I would be at a loss if I lost access to my email for a little while. I have configured outlook to use my gmail account and sure enough all those .eml attachments had pictures and attachments, some of them even 5 levels deep. By that I mean after I open the email there is an attachment which has attachment which has an atatchment etc..... then finally I see the email that i was intended to see like pics or whatever. It would be nice if gmail could view these messages. Anyone know of a webmail provider that can see these message types in the browser?

I know for sure in FastMail you can read and even detach attached emails (usually forwarded) but I'm not sure if they're .eml or something else.

I'm not positive, but I seem to recall that I used to sometimes open EML attachments in Fastmail.fm, back when I used to use that service on a more regular/frequent basis. Unfortunately, free fastmail accounts, and even membership level accounts (maybe even "full" accounts for all I can remember), have only the tiniest fraction of the storage space that Gmail has.

I also seem to at least vaguely recall that I used to sometimes open EML attachments in my Myrealbox.com accounts back when I used that service on a regular basis. Unfortunately, like Fastmail, MRB accounts are tiny by recent standards and AFAIK they aren't even accepting new registrations at the moment.

So how's that for useful information?

But for all I know almost any webmail system except Gmail may be able to open such attachments, a hypothesis which I'd be glad to test for myself if I could only think of a convenient way to send such an attachment to a few of my own addresses at various services. I'm not sure how to do that, though, as a webmail-only user myself.

Edit:Since this has sort of become a "non-Gmail-specific" question, perhaps it wouldn't strictly be considered a violation of the forum rule against cross-posting to post this more general question to the "Email Help Needed" forum where more people might see it? (Or maybe the "Technical Zone" would be more appropriate, I'm not sure.)

If you have no email client, the best way is to associate .eml files with Internet Explorer (Control Panel, Folder Options, File Types). Then in Gmail, click download, then View. The .eml attachment should now be readable.

EML files can be opened in notepad. It can be read as plain text except if there is an attachment in the EML it can't be access except in Outlook Express.