Automatically save word document attachments as plain text

Product: EZDetach for Microsoft Outlook Attachments

In some cases, you might need to save Word document attachments as plain text files. For example, to save resumes in an applicant tracking system; or in order to import documents into a document management system; or for some other reason. EZDetach makes that process very easy. Simply follow the steps below.

Note: you must have Microsoft Word installed for this method to work.

  1. Save this file doc2txt.vbs to c:\doc2txt.vbs
  2. Select one or more messages with Word documents attached and click the EZDetach Outlook toolbar button.
  3. In the EZDetach "Save Attachments" dialog, check "Detach only if attachment name contains..." and type "doc" (without quotes) in the field next to it.
  4. Check the "Execute" checkbox and put c:\doc2txt.vbs in the field next to it.
  5. Click "Open Folder" to open the destination folder.
  6. Click "Save Now"
  7. That's it. You should see the saved files in the destination folder.

Exported files will be saved with a ".txt" extension. For example, if an attachment is called resume.doc, the converted text file will be called resume.doc.txt.

You can also follow the above steps to create Rule Wizard rules with EZDetach to automatically convert attachments in incoming messages. See EZDetach User Guide for more information on creating rules with EZDetach.

Note: doc2txt.vbs script we provide is very simple, just to illustrate the approach. It can be made more robust/feature full to fit your needs.

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