Strange Outlook message

Xenophobic · 28-06-2001 5:44pm #1

Hi all,

Wierd one, when changing the name (extension from .Jar to .blah_blah) of a file in the Outlook Save dialog box I got the following msgbox

"If you change a file name extension, the file may become unstable. Are you sure you want to change it?

for details see C:\temp\wcerr.txt."

Now obviously it was the las bit that struck me as wierd - see a text file for further details??!??!

The contents of the aforementioned file are as follows:

06/28/2001 12:59:06
HTTP 404 Not Found
<HTML><HEAD><TITLE>404 Not Found</TITLE></HEAD>
<BODY BGCOLOR="#cc9999"><H2>404 Not Found</H2>
The requested URL '/_vti_bin/shtml.exe/_vti_rpc' was not found on this server.
<HR>
<ADDRESS><A HREF="http://www.acme.com/software/thttpd/">thttpd/2.07 02dec99</A></ADDRESS>
</BODY></HTML>

Is MS Outlook doing some adverts on the side??????????????????????

Xeno

Victor · 28-06-2001 9:14pm

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Xenophobic:
Wierd one, when changing the name (extension from .Jar to .blah_blah) of a file in the Outlook Save dialog box I got the following msgbox

"If you change a file name extension, the file may become unstable. Are you sure you want to change it?</font>

This is normal - if for example you changed *.blh to *.blah or *._, the the operating sytem (Windows usually) and the application associated with *.blh wouldn't know that it was a *.blh type file. that is what the message means.

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Xenophobic:
for details see C:\temp\wcerr.txt."

Now obviously it was the las bit that struck me as wierd - see a text file for further details??!??!

The contents of the aforementioned file are as follows:

06/28/2001 12:59:06
HTTP 404 Not Found
<HTML><HEAD><TITLE>404 Not Found</TITLE></HEAD>
<BODY BGCOLOR="#cc9999"><H2>404 Not Found</H2>
The requested URL '/_vti_bin/shtml.exe/_vti_rpc' was not found on this server.
<HR>
<ADDRESS><A HREF="http://www.acme.com/software/thttpd/">thttpd/2.07 02dec99</A></ADDRESS>
</BODY></HTML></font>

I presume there is a 'stock' answer to the questions one might ask - I suspect that is what the hypertext link is for (updating the 'stock' answer) - but I won't swear on that. Too often today, software assumes you have an 'always-on' internet connection.

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Xenophobic:
Is MS Outlook doing some adverts on the side??????????????????????</font>

Possibly not, but I wouldn't put it past them.

Too many freaks, not enough circuses.

Xenophobic · 28-06-2001 11:39pm

Victor,

It wasn't the first part that was bothering me (I was just copying another file over of the same name and i wanted to keep a backup e.g. x.jar_old), it was that text file reference that's wierd.

I can't really imagine MS farming out their error messages to third parties (I'm sure Sun would be first in line for that option: "File Not Found, please install Unix"

, besides all that would be held in a help file)

The acme site seems to contain alot of utilities, and the thttpd referenced is a utility called "tiny/turbo/throttling HTTP server"

wcerr is a C++ object used to control wide stream output to the error stream (I only understood half of that) so it looks like Outlook handled some exception by dumping it to that file, why it contains that data I'm not too sure.

Further searches on the _vti_bin/shtml.exe/_vti_rpc show its relating to MS front page and seems to show stats for your website.

Strange... no?

Strange Outlook message

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