We recently reported that nitroso aromatics react rapidly with glyoxylic acid in aqueous solution to produce N-hydroxyformanilides? During an attempt to apply this reaction for the synthesis of a previously unknown and highly reactive hydroxamic acid 2, we found that the final product was actually the corresponding formanilide 3. The direct condensation of glyoxylic acid and N, N-dimethylp-nitrosoaniline (1) to give 3 is not possible, so it was of ...