Help my cousin add extensions

[Phil]

He knows nothing about computers. When he creates a Word document and then saves it, he doesn't type ".doc" on the end of the file name. So it gets saved on disk as "recipe" instead of "recipe.doc" and then when he e-mails it to my mother, she has to rename it "recipe.doc" or else her computer doesn't know what application to open it in.

But every other computer I've seen automatically add ".doc" to the file name when you save it, if you didn't add it yourself. In fact, every application automatically adds .bmp (for bitmaps), .jpg (for jpegs), .xls (for excel sheets) etc. automatically. I have never had to manually type an extension; it still gets saved like that.

Do you know where the setting is that affects this behavior? Thanks very much for your help.

P.S. when my cousin chooses Save As..., the dialog box is currently showing "Word Document (.doc)" in the Save As Type textbox.

-Phil

[Steve Grondin]

Do you know the version of Word he is using?
I am using 2003.

Have him look at the Tools menu > Save Options inside the "Save As" window. Is the Default Format > Save Word files as: set to Word Document (*.doc) ?

[IAm@Work.com]

I'll get the obvious out of the way first so you can ignore it. Have them both buy a Mac. In the Macintosh operating system, ever file is saved with both the data and metadata including what program created it. Thus, any file can be opened without having to name it with an extension to tell the computer what to do.

For the Windows world.

Have him double click on 'My Computer'. He should find a menus selection for Tools… Folder options. Select the 'View' tab. There should be a check box for 'Hide extensions for known file types. Uncheck this box.

That should be enough for the extensions to start showing up everywhere.

[squareone]

Maybe he is already using a mac! That would explain the lack of extensions, since us civilized people don't really use them.

Barbarians.

[JohnGalt]

Originally Posted by IAm@*********

I'll get the obvious out of the way first so you can ignore it. Have them both buy a Mac.

I heard a rumor that they're coming out with Tetris for the Mac. You know anything about that?