I've got a feeling that various versions of Internet Explorer have a
tendancy to ignore the server returned MIME type in favour of "guessing"
what the data being returned really is (i.e. it assumes that a .DOC
extension must be a Word document, regardless of the MIME type) - if I can
find any more concrete info on this, I'll post further details.
On a slightly more helpful note, the MIME types used by Microsoft IIS4 can
be easily altered too:
1. launch the IIS Management Console (IIS.MSC)
2. right-click on name of the server (under the "Internet Information
Server" branch) and select "properties"
3. you should see a section marked "Computer MIME Map", click on the "File
Types..." button
From there you should be able to alter the MIME type for .DOC files.
Off the top of my head, the process is very similar for IIS5 on Windows
2000.
It also possible to set MIME types for specific web sites (if you are
running multiple web sites with IIS on the same server) by selecting the
properties for the individual web site and then choosing the "HTTP Headers"
tab.
Dave Pattern
INHALE Project
-----Original Message-----
From: Peter Arien [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>to right click and Save As first.
This is also a server thingy. On unix platforms with the apache server, the
.doc extention is known to the webserver as type application/msword (cfr
/usr/local/blackboard/httpd/conf/mime.types). This type is sent to the
browser prior to sending the actual document. If the browser recognises this
type as something it should handle with MSWord it will do so (asking you if
it can do so, and giving you the option to skip that question so it will
allways use MSWord to open a .doc file).
If you change the mime-type of .doc files to application/octet-stream, the
browser should _always_ suggest to save that document.
You could configure this per-course with .htaccess files :
AddType application/msword .doc
--
Peter
ex-blackboard-sysadmin
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