A number of people have reported that they cannot open attachments on my email messages, particularly letters and photos. We have the latest version of Windows and use Microsoft Word for email attachments. Should we be converting our attachments into a previous version of Windows?

In order to fully diagnose issues such as this I need additional information, particularly the email program that you are using (e.g. Outlook, Outlook Express, Thunderbird) together with what actually happens when the recipients of the email attempt to open the attachments. The version of Windows is immaterial to the ability of the recipient to open email attachments, as the files are independent of the operating system. For example, I could email you attachments from a Mac computer and, as long as you have the correct software on your computer to view the attachments (such as Microsoft Word for DOC files), then you can open and view the files without any problems.

From your description of the problem I assume that you are trying to email Word documents and pictures (most likely JPEG photos). In theory, the recipient should be able to view both without issue as Windows can open pictures, without any third-party software, and Windows can also open Word documents using WordPad, which is included within Windows itself. As such, if you are sending these types of files it should not be a problem with the file format, but instead seems to be a problem with the actual sending of the email messages and perhaps something that is going wrong between your end and the recipients end. Please send me more specific details about the problem. In particular, information about exactly why the recipients of the message cannot open the attachments, together with the email client which you are using.