How do I handle Microsoft outlook winmail.dat? Any other surprises?

Question

Ive decided that I really dont like microsoft and their ways. Please could you give me directions on how to handle winmail.dat in emails, is there a jython library or a java library that will allow me to handle this.

Ive just completed a email processing program, written in jython 2.2.1 on java 5. During the final load test, I realised that attachments that should have been in a standard MIME email format is now tied up in some blasted winmail.dat, which means many different outlook clients pollute the internet with this winmail.dat, so that means i need to support winmail.dat. Thus my program failed to process the data correctly.

Please could you give a short description on what winmail.dat is and why it is here to annoy us.

What other surprises can be expected!? what else do I have to watch out for, so far standard MIME emails are catered for. Are there any other jack in the boxes?

Thanks so much for your time.

Answer 1

read here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TNEF

a package for parsing here:
https://github.com/verdammelt/tnef