Figure B shows where you set the default email program in Internet Options.

FIGURE B

This is where you set the default email program in Internet Options. Click picture for a larger image.

Figure C shows the results in Notes.

FIGURE C

These are the results in Notes. Click picture for a larger image.

It works, but it's quite slow, particularly if Notes isn't running and has to be started. You may also have noted from the above image that the attachment is stored in Notes as a "V2-style" attachment and isn't anchored in the Rich Text.

While this works, it's quite limiting. For starters, you begin the email with the files you want to send. Yes, I know that good practice is to attach before writing so that you don't forget the attachment, but this is complete reversal of thinking about sending an email. It's the change from "I'm going send an email and include an attachment" to "I'm going to take this file and email it." People just tend to start by writing the email, and starting an email by selecting files in Windows Explorer is a pretty alien concept. And if you want to add another attachment after you've started, you do that the "old" way inside the email, or send another one, or start over. Sending a self-extracting file is very convoluted. You need to open WinZip, make the self-extracting file, open that with WinZip, and then send it.

So WinZip does the job, but it's not its prime functionality. The usability in this respect is pretty poor.

PKZip for Lotus Notes
PKZip for Lotus Notes. (at http://www.pkware.com) is a part of the whole PKZip family, adding their functionality to Notes email. The offering is as much slanted towards using zip files as an encryption medium as much as it is from a compression point of view. All I'm interested in here is compression, but the install and operation is, as far as I could tell, the same whatever you are using it for.

The fact that it's part of the PKZip family shows as soon as you try to install it. You have to install pretty much the whole of PKZip to use it; that means the base PKZip piece and then the Internet Explorer add on, and then the Notes bit. But the installation is pretty simple, with just the one panel to specify all the options, as shown in Figure D, and that spawning all the different installers to get it all done.

FIGURE D

All options for PKZip can be specified on one panel. Click picture for a larger image.

Once that has been done, you need to run the Notes Configuration piece. This upgrades (alters) the design of your mail file. Gulp! It does take a design backup first, but what it does with it is't documented. It's called design_backup_xxxx.nsf, where the xxxx is replaced with the filename of your mail database. The design change is done with the Notes supplied nConvert program. What you get is a standard Notes 5 mail file design with some actions added to the Memo and Reply forms. Your folders are retained, so long as they are design protected. Any non-protected changes you've made are lost, and that will of course mean that if you've changed the Memo and Reply forms and protected them, you don't get the changes!