I'm wondering if the folder that contains the email has additional flags set. I've seen people try to open an email and it auto looks like a template or draft email, but I've not heard of people opening an attachment and it looks like a template or draft email.

Download and install addon : folderFlags

If it is the 'Inbox' folder then only the 'Inbox' flag should be set. But it sounds like you may also have a 'Templates' or 'Drafts' flag.

See images as guide

Please report back on what you discovered.

Thank you. I downloaded the extension and checked. Only the "inbox" flag was checked. So.... any other ideas?

re :Instead i get a full-screen "reply" template

If it was a 'Reply or Template' then it would be opening in a Thunderbird 'Write' window. It would say 'Write' in top left corner.

If you use Firefox browser can you make sure the Title Bar is enabled. Menu icon > More Tools > Customise Toolbar At the bottom select the checkbox 'Title' to show the Title bar.

Is this opening in a new browser window as if it were html ?

Can you please post an image - screenshot.

Okay, i use Chrome rather than Firefox. So.... i was looking for an example to screenshot, and i discovered -- with a random sampling -- that this only appears to happen with .doc attachments, not with .docx, .pdf, .jpg, etc. With the .doc attachments, they definitely open in another window. I've done screenshots of an old saved email from my daughter when she was in high school.

First screenshot is the email. I click on the attachment button and get

Second screenshot. The new window opens full screen but i've moved it so you can see there are now two.

Third screenshot is what happens when i click the .doc attachment button -- a third window.

Ad infinitum.

Well, crap. I just attempted to add the first screenshot. After 10 minutes, i get these two lines (neither are links):

Uploaded images:

Uploading "one.png"...

So i guess i can't send you screenshots. Hopefully i've described it well enough. Thanks in any case.

They are opening in a new window - do you mean opening in a new 'Chrome' window ?

re :Uploading "one.png"...

Yes, sometimes it seems there is a 'bad gateway', - I've seen this on occasions and noticed I could scroll the page and see 'Bad Gateway' written at bottom of page.

So I refresh the page and retry. It does work eventually.

re : general > files & attachments settings all show "use LibreOffice Writer"

I use Open Office Writer, so same as you - not MS product.

In Files & Attachments I have: Content Type: Microsoft Word 97-2003 Document set to open with 'Use OpenOffice Writer'

In your list does it specifically say 'Microsoft Word 97-2003 Document' ?

What items in your list are set to open using 'Chrome' ? I only have 'Firefox HTML Document' - 'Use Firefox default'

If you save the .doc attachment to desktop and then click on it to open, does it open in LibreOffice or in Chrome ?

In email which has the attachment - Select email so you can read in Mesasge Pane click on 'More' and select 'View Source'

You should see something like this A load of headers followed by:

• This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
• --------------daYbc8HBmIXqXBgB8gQ3t2ni
• Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8
• Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

followed by html head body content stuff then follows the attachment - something like this:

• --------------daYbc8HBmIXqXBgB8gQ3t2ni
• Content-Type: application/msword; name="other.doc"
• Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="other.doc"
• Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64

followed by a load of letters etc

But what do you see in your email ? Please post the same info as I've displayed.

So the new window is a Thunderbird "reply" template.

Refreshing the page isn't really possible as it's not a web page, merely a template.

In the attachment part of "general," the only mention of Chrome (HTML Document) is under "Content Type." The "action" is "always ask."

Under DOC file, no matter what i do for "action," it always reads "use other..." I click on that, and choose LibreOffice, and close, but it doesn't stay there.

It also lists "Microsoft Word 97-2003 Document." That, along with "Microsoft Word Document," both show "use LibreOffice Writer" as the action.

Okay... just tried right-clicking, and it gave me a "save as" option, so i saved to desktop as Word, which then opened in LibreOffice. THIS COULD BE THE FIX! There aren't many of these, so i think i can live with that.

I think that's enough to sort-of solve this. However, here is the source code:

From - Wed Jul 20 18:21:43 2022 X-Mozilla-Status: 0001 X-Mozilla-Status2: 00000000 X-Mozilla-Keys: From: "Clarice Scop" <claricescop@yahoo.com> To: "Jon Scop" <jscop@telus.net> Subject: hihihi:) Date: Tue, 3 Apr 2012 21:51:13 -0700 Message-ID: <008801d89c9a$5f35af00$1da10d00$@yahoo.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_0089_01D89C5F.B2D6D700" X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook 16.0 X-MailStoreMapiMimePostProcessor: 22.2.1.20836 X-MailStore-Folder-UTF7: default/Outlook Outlook Data File/Clarice X-MailStore-Message-ID: <327e5bfc977e8c48a32e2b51517e6384@xchg-searchkey.mailstore.com> X-MailStore-Header-Hash: 0000000000000000000000008036ffb135e0ce08 X-MailStore-Date: 20120404045115 X-MailStore-ArcDate: 20220721003944 X-MailStore-Flags: 6

This is a multipart message in MIME format.

Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_001_008A_01D89C5F.B2D72520"

Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

is the paper!

D byebyes

Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

I think the end of my message got cut off. What i said was that the fact that i can "save as" and then read it is good enough for me, as i only have this problem with a small amount of attachments. I really appreciate your help!

You posted header view info on plain and the html but you forgot to include the last bit which is about the actual attachment.

It should look something like this:

    --------------daYbc8HBmIXqXBgB8gQ3t2ni
   Content-Type: application/msword; name="other.doc"
   Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="other.doc"
   Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64

Well, what's below what i already sent is a massive block of characters, far too long to post given the character limit here. So i'm leaving that out. What's directly ABOVE it is:

Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

Okay, for some reason this reply window is not showing what i just pasted in. Another try:

Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

So, after the email does not contain any reference to the attachment type and filename in the source view? there is no mention of this line: Content-Type: application/msword;

It's due to person using Outlook - sending using Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable. It means Thunderbird thinks the attachment is a HTML email because there is nothing stating the attachment type.

See if the following works, you can always switch it back:

Menu icon > Settings > General Scroll to bottom and click on 'Config Editor' It opens in a new tab - accept warning In search Type: body Look for : 'mailnews.display.show_all_body_parts_menu' and set it to 'True'

Then choose another email - reselect the email with attachment and test.

I tried that, but it didn't change anything, so i set it back to the way it was. Really, since this happens with a minority of old messages, and since i discovered (with your help) that i can see them if i simply save to my desktop as a .doc which opens with LibreOffice, that's a good enough solution for me. Thanks again!