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General discussion

Outlook 2007 and .msg files

Feb 12, 2010 9:46PM PST

I received some short film clips in an Outlook email as .msg files that played without any problem in Outlook for XP. I now have Office 2007 and the same film clips will not play in Outlook (2007). .msg files should open in Outlook so what has happened? Can anyone help please.

Judesman

Discussion is locked

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msg files?
Feb 13, 2010 4:49AM PST

Do you mean mpg files? I don't recognise the video file format .msg

What happens if you save the attachment to your hard drive, (a good temporary locaton is the Desktop), then play the movie file from there? If you have Windows Media Player or any other media player that accepts .mpg files, that should work.

Mark

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Mark. They are .msg files and.....
Feb 13, 2010 2:49PM PST

they open in Outlook. I have had then saved in my docs for years and when I open them they open in Outlook and the clips play. But in Outlook 2007 they open in Outlook but don't play. .msg is listed in file associations in Win 7 as being associated with Outlook. They won't play in Media Player. Thanks for your reply.

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.msg files
Feb 13, 2010 7:32PM PST

Hi Judesman.

I'm having difficulty finding anything relevant about .msg files. The link below lists all video file types, and I can't see .nsg there;
http://www.fileinfo.com/filetypes/video

However, in that same web site, looking under alpha "M", I can see that .msg fies are "Outlook Mail Message";
http://www.fileinfo.com/list/m

That doesn't help me with your problem. It seems to me that .msg files are Microsoft's Outlook Mail files, eg;

"Message created or saved within Microsoft Outlook; contains multiple e-mail fields, including the date, sender, recipient, subject, and message body; compatible with other programs that use Microsoft's Messaging Applications Programming Interface (MAPI)."

So I have to conclude that the .msg files you have are not video files. Whether or not those individual files 'contain' videos is another matter. If they do, then how do you extract the video files to play them? I don't know.

I have found what seems to be a utility from Microsoft to index these files and search through them, and that utility will find any attachment names and indicate them. I don't know how useful that would be. It's compatable with Vista and XP, but Windows 7 is not mentioned. I don't know if it will affect Outlook 2007;
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=134ECBB0-C162-4D07-BEF3-0B602C4A79DD&displaylang=en

There's more on .msg files here; http://www.fileformat.info/format/outlookmsg/

I am not sure how any of this will help you.

May I ask, when you installed Office 2007, did you import your emails and settings from your previous version of Outlook?

Mark

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Mark: Thank you for all your efforts...
Feb 14, 2010 2:40AM PST

..this is much appreciated. I appreciate that .msg files are not video files but regardless of that these emails contained "endless loop" video clips that played when opened in Otlook 2002. I saved the clips to my documents and deleted the emails. Whenever I opened the files in my docs the clips played in Outlook. All my Outlook settings were imported to Outlook 2007 along with the my docs folder that was transferred to Win 2007. Now when I open the .msg files in my docs the files open in Outlook but the clips do not play. You have suggeested there might be a compatability problem with Win 2007 and I wonder whether that is the answer. You have put a lot of time into this and it is apprciated but I wonder if this is one for the Microsoft support forum (Not my favourite place)

Judesman.

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Re: msg file.
Feb 13, 2010 7:39PM PST

A .msg file is what Outlook saves a mail in on your hard disk, if you want to save it as a separate file in stead of just a mail inside your pst-file.

A mail, in essence, is text (either plain text or html) and attachments. Text isn't video. So I assume that one or more of the attachments are video files. All you've got to do: find the right player for the particular type of video file it is. Install that and the video will play. From your post it seems that Windows Media Player isn't the right one.

- What's the file extension? That might lead to an advice about the player to use.
- Open source VLC media player plays most types. Worth a try? See http://www.videolan.org/vlc/download-windows.html

Kees


Kees

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Kees: Thank you for your reply...
Feb 14, 2010 3:06AM PST

..apart from .msg there is no indication of any video file attached to the .msg file. As you will see from my reply to Mark these files saved in my docs opened in Outlook 2002 but in Outlook 2007 the files open but will not play. I agree that these are not video files but I wonder why they played in 2002 but not 2007. I will have a look at the VLC media player. Thank you for your input.

Judesman

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Re: msg file.
Feb 14, 2010 3:39AM PST

You've got to open a .msg-file in Outlook to see the attachments. In stead of an attachment, they could also contain a link, of course, to the video somewhere on Internet.

How big (number of bytes) is such a .msg file? If something like 1000 or 10.000 it surely doesn't contain a video. A decent video runs in the megabytes.

It might help to have a look at the source of the email. Read how to do that in http://www.technologyquestions.com/technology/microsoft-office/61907-view-html-source-outlook-2007-a.html

Kees

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Kees: That's it...
Feb 14, 2010 4:56AM PST

I have opened the file in Outlook and saved as HTML. That created a folder with a number of files including a GIF image file. That opens in IE8 and the clip plays. I am not much of a techi so can you explain what has happened please? Thanks for your help but it is a mystery why the clips won't play in Outlook 2007.

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That fully explains it.
Feb 14, 2010 5:03AM PST

It's by design. Outlook 2007 uses the html-engine from Word, not the one from IE, and that doesn't support animated gif.

http://www.brighthub.com/office/collaboration/articles/21808.aspx explains and has a workaround.

Or find another email client that supports it. You might even try the webmail of your ISP, because that uses your browser.

Kees

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Kees. Thank you very much...
Feb 14, 2010 6:19AM PST

.. I have saved that link - lots of useful stuff about Outlook 2007.

Judesman

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Glad you got it sorted finally.
Feb 14, 2010 7:20PM PST

Good work by you both.

I read that article about Outlook 2007 and Gif animations, and in truth I can't say I am any wiser, Happy

I understand that Outlook 2007 now renders HTML in emails the same way that Word 2007 renders HTML, and that is different to browsers.

But what I am confused about are your video clips. Are they in Gif format? If so I have not heard of that. I know that Gifs can be animated, I have used Gifs myself in the past. But to make a video out of Gifs must be very time consuming.

Or may be I missed something in the reading.

Mark

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Re: reading
Feb 14, 2010 9:31PM PST

Mark,

You're the one that introduced the term "video" (post #2). The OP just says "clips" and "played". And from the remainder of this thread I understand he means an animated gif. That's kind of a clip and it kinda plays.

So you didn't MISS anything, you ADDED something (that turned out to be wrong).

Kees

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Ohh yes!
Feb 15, 2010 4:42AM PST

I did, didn't I . LOL

I understand now, and thanks Kees, and Judesman for your post below.

Mark

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Mark. My understanding is that...
Feb 14, 2010 11:50PM PST

by opening these files in Outlook and re-saving them as HTML I discovered that the original file was an animated GIF. That used to play in Outlook 2002 but won't in Outlook 2007 because of the way 2007 has been configured (If that is the right term). The files now play in IE8. That is what I understand from the Outlook 2007 link. If I am wrong perhaps Kees would correct me please.

Thanks to you all.

Judesman.