Can't open email attachments with .dat extensions

I get emails from a friend who sends many jokes. Some of the attachments have the .dat extension. I can never open these. Is there some software that enables this?

 

The extension DAT is much too generic to be used by only one program. The windows registry files are DAT files. AVG creates DAT files for each partition when doing a complete scan. Some programs create their own DAT files for their own use in their folders. So on and so forth. DAT is usually short for DATA.
You can use Notepad to open them, and you can read any text there.

 

kendall--Is that .dat file winmail.dat? If yes, that is an attachment to emails using a format unique to MS Outlook. A very long winded explanation is
http://www.gpc.edu/~jbenson/resource/winmail.htm
Unless you use Outlook (which you apparently do not), or download the decoder mentioned, the only solution is for you to request that the sender stop using this format when emailing you and rather use Plain Text or Rich Text.
In any event, I do not think you are supposed to open winmail.dat . It is rather part of the formatting of the email.

 

Thanks for replies

These emails are the "winmail.dat" variety...........I will follow up on both suggestions.........