If you were using a version of Outlook Express earlier than version 6, you're probably wondering what's happened to the simple steps you used to follow to save an attachment. In Outlook Express, any attachment is regarded as potentially able to cause problems, the worst case scenario being that the attachment may contain a virus.
At the first level of protection, if you receive an attachment, for example a Word document, but you haven't got a program installed on your computer that can open a Word document, the name of the file will be greyed out and you can't save it. Similarly, if you receive an Acrobat Reader file (a PDF file), recognised by being named "something.pdf", you won't be able to save it unless you've got the free Acrobat Reader installed.
Some other types of files, such as Excel spreadsheet files, are seen as potentially dangerous because they might contain Office macro code that a malicious sender could possibly use to cause chaos on your computer.
If you need to change some security settings in Outlook Express, use Tools - Options and click the Security tab. Settings in Outlook Express are tied to those of Internet Explorer by the way. While you have Options on the screen, choose the Read tab and tick the "Read all messages in plain text" for peace of mind.
Remember that webDotWiz has for some time encouraged everybody to browse the contents of their inbox by using their Internet Service Provider's webmail facility. Doing this ensures you can get rid of any dubious posts before they get anywhere near your computer even though it may take a few extra minutes. If you use Outlook Express alone to collect your mail, the first time you see your posts are when they've landed in your inbox on your hard drive and so the chance of nasties making a nuisance of themselves is increased.
Sometimes IE can begin to misbehave, for example new pages don't open when you click a link. Many problems can be fixed by some simple maintenance which you should regularly carry out.
Start IE, go to the Tools menu and choose Internet Options. By the way, we're assuming everybody has run the Windows Security update CD and have IE6 installed.
A third of the way down the options dialogue box (on the General tab) you'll see the heading "Temporary Internet Files". Click the "Delete Files..." button and on the next dialogue box, click "OK". Depending on how many files have been temporarily stored, and thus how much space has been used on your hard drive, it could take a minute or two before the job finishes.
It's particularly important to clean out IE's temporary files folder on a regular basis if you watch movies or video clips (you're on broadband) or listen for long periods to Internet radio stations (ISDN or dialup) because the streaming video or sound file after a couple of hours will amount to tens or even hundreds of megabytes.
