I often receive Word files or PDFs by email. It’s not a problem — I use Gmail’s web interface for handling my email and often choose to view the attachment as HTML or in Google Docs. Sometimes I download them and view them on my own machine.
The other day though I received a Word file I needed to download onto my Mac and view there. I downloaded the file and then tried my usual methods for opening Word files: view in TextEdit or Pages.
Something was wrong though, and although I tried all kinds of things I could not get that file to open.
Eventually I emailed my correspondent and asked for the file as a PDF. I needed to view the document, but not edit it, so PDF would work fine.
Except it didn’t. The PDF arrived, I downloaded it and then was unable to open it, whatever application I tried.
This was bizarre. I routinely open Word files and PDFs without trouble.
Then I had an idea. I opened Apple Mail and grabbed the attachments. Both opened just fine after downloading with Mail.app.
I don’t know if this is related to the ‘noname’ bug, but if it strikes you try using a different mail software and see if that helps.
