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Opening Emails With Different Extensions

This has become a faq for me - "I received an email I can't open! It ends with .email. How can I view it??"

Easily - you can open any email that arrives with a different extension than the default .eml. All you have to do is give the odd extension the same association as .eml has.

Though it involves editing the registry, it is not difficult or dangerous since you are not changing any existing values. However, unless you are familiar and comfortable working with the registry, I advise that you always back it up before doing any reg editing. For the easiest way to backup and restore your Win9x registry, see my "Easiest Way To Manually Backup and Restore the Windows 95\98\98se Registry" or my article in Volume 5 of ABC. 

Once you have your registry backed up, proceed.

I'll use the extension .email in this example. This seems to be a common one.

There are two ways you can set the correct email association in the registry.

Use the method you prefer, but I would say this first method is the easiest way.

Method 1
Launch regedit and go to:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and expand it by clicking the plus sign next to it.
Scroll down to find select.eml and select it (the entries are arranged alphabetically)
Click Registry>Export Registry File
Export and save the file to your desktop as a Registration file (.reg)
Give it any name you want.
Exit the registry and go to your desktop.
Right click your exported reg file and choose Edit.
Replace .eml with .email
Save the change and close the file.
Now double click it to merge the change to your registry.
And that's it.
From now on, all emails arriving with a .email extension will open with the same application used to open your regular .eml emails.

Method 2
Go to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT
Right click the Root key and choose New - Key.
Name the new key .email
(don't forget the dot .)
Click View-Refresh to put your new key in alphabetical order.
Then in the right hand pane for your new .email key, double click Default and enter Microsoft Internet Mail Message.
Finally, right click an empty area in the right hand pane and choose New - String Value and name it Content Type.
Double click it and enter message/rfc822
as the value.

Any emails you now get with a .email extension will open as regular .eml messages do.

Note - in the event the second method doesn't work, the cause can only be an incorrect entry. To check, you would just go to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT/.eml and make sure the values in the right hand pane are identical to the ones you entered for .email.

Vic Ferri owns the very popular WinTips and Tricks and Registry Answers.  Subscribe to either and receive free Windows and Registry Tips.  He is also in charge of the Printing Tips  pages at Linda's Computer Stop.  Vic has also created a program which allows you to Lock & Hide desktop folders in Windows 9X/ME.  Read more and get the free demo here.  And, he now offers a service to convert PowerPoint presentations to .exe files which can be viewed on computers which do not have PowerPoint installed.