Being new to the Macintosh, I’m “discovering” things for the first time that are ancient history for most Mac users. That is entirely to be expected. But I must admit I totally mis-diagnosed a mysterious email attachment I received today.

At the bottom of the email was this enigmatic information:

The file was from my brother, and I was actually expecting something from him- some photos. I immediately went looking to find out what “Corel Snapfire Plus” is, discovered that it is a Windows-only application, and thought I had my solution. Obviously, thought I, winmail.dat files are some sort of proprietary image format produced by Snapfire.

I was completely wrong. Apparently, winmail.dat files are the result of using Rich Text and attachments with Windows Outlook to send email to non-Windows users. The file itself is encoded using something called “Transport Neutral Encapsulation format”- the link above explains this proprietary Microsoft format in a bit more detail. Apparently, this affliction only impacts mail sent with Outlook (the exchange client): not Outlook Express, or Windows Mail (the POP/SMTP mail clients).

There are a couple of ways of decoding winmail.dat files on the Mac: the two main choices are:

• TNEF, which is a free utility that requires you to save the winmail.dat file then drag-n-drop it to decode
• OMiC, which is a shareware program ($10 Euros, about $15 Canadian) that integrates with Apple’s mail application and decodes winmail.dat files on the fly

I bought OMiC, so hopefully that’s the last time that particular problem will surprise me

I’ve had my Mac for a couple of days now, and I’m having fun with it. Since it’s a laptop, it is often more at hand then my main PC. That, coupled with a somewhat intriguing calendaring and address book application, has convinced me to migrate my email.

I pondered simply using my existing POP email account with my MacBook, but decided that the experience I was having with the .Mac service 60 day trial was something I wanted to continue. .Mac is basically the Apple equivalent to Windows Live services: online mail, website hosting, net-based disk, and calendar sharing.

The approach I decided to follow to email migration was intriguing. I have an archive of several hundred megabytes of email that I wanted to retain, so getting it on my Mac was an important milestone. I first subscribed to .Mac so I would have the 10 GB of online storage you get with that package. .Mac supports IMAP email, where the mail messages are stored/persisted on the server rather than on your personal computer. I connected to .Mac with my Windows Vista PC and Windows Mail. Windows Mail is able to create folders and copy emails to an IMAP service and, since everything is stored on Apple’s servers, when I connected my Mac those same folders were available. Voila- email migrated.

The address book migration was also fairly simple. I don’t have very many entries in my address book- 50 or so. The address book in Vista is completely different from Windows XP and previous versions of Windows- instead of a single .WAB file, each contact exists in its own file in the Contacts directory. The Macintosh doesn’t recognize these files, but it can recognise vCard formatted contacts. If you create an email in Windows Mail and drag the contents of your Contacts folder to it, Windows will automagically convert your contacts into individual vCard files and attach them to the email. Just put those attachments in a directory on your Mac and use the Address book File=> Import Vcards option. Voila- addresses migrated.

I’ve forwarded my old email address to my new .Mac email address. I even received my first half-dozen emails today, so things appear to be working as planned. It’s a miracle!

27 years ago, I bought an Apple II+. That was my first computer, and I have many fond memories of its 16 kilobyte wonder.

When the Macintosh came out in 1984, I really wanted one. Unfortunately, it was several thousand dollars too expensive, and I had already committed to spending several thousand dollars on a Unix based machine. Years went by: I bought an IBM compatible machine for business related reasons, and eventually ended up working almost exclusively with various types of non-Apple technology. Many Windows+Intel machines have taken their place in my home, and hundreds more have served their role in my place of work.

In recent years, I’ve spent an increasing amount of time supporting various Linux systems. I’ve always liked working with various flavours of Unix. And about a year ago, for the first time in quite a while, I bought a system other than a PC to play games- an XBox 360. Around the same time, I spent several weeks debating purchase of a laptop. These various factors have conspired to lead to today, a day that will live on in the annals of my life.

I bought a Macintosh. To be more specific, a MacBook Pro (laptop). I have a number of rationales for this. It fulfils my desire to have a personal laptop, for one thing. It also encourages/permits me to explore a collection of technology that intrigues me: the Mac operating system is Unix-based (BSD), and has a ton of intriguing user interface characterstics.

The last factor that comes to mind is that having another machine allows me to split out one “group” of activities into their own environment. I play games on my home PC, I work on my work laptop…where do I learn? If I try to complete some self study on my home computer, I am prone to interrupting myself to “play”..and similiarly work interrupts me on my work machine. Yeah, there are a lot of less expensive ways to accomplish the same end, but this way I get to accomodate my desire to play with a Macintosh.

So…am I a PC guy, or a Mac guy? Personally, I think I’m just a geek, either way