Old vs new MS Office file formats

[nsane.forums]

With Office 2007, Microsoft introduced entirely new file formats for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Designated by an x at the end of the file extension (.docx instead of .doc, and so on), these were not backward compatible.

Initially, I wasn't happy with this change. I'm generally conservative about popular and established file formats--especially those supported by a great many software venders--and don't want them to be changed. And almost everyone in the office software business has been supporting .doc and .xls for years.

But Microsoft did an excellent job making the transition as easy as possible, and ensuring that both the old and the new formats would remain readable. (If anyone thinks I'm a shill for Microsoft, I suggest they read Why you shouldn’t upgrade to Windows 8.)

You'll have no trouble loading an old .doc file into a modern version of Word. (I'm discussing Word specifically for convenience sake. Everything I say here also works for Excel and PowerPoint.) Just double-click the file and it will open.

You can also save a .doc file, so that people using older versions can read it. In the Save As dialog box, click the Save as pull-down menu and select Word 97-2003 Documents (*.doc).

Previous versions of Word were written without knowledge of the .docx format, so you can't expect them to read it without a little help. But the help is there. If you're using Office 2003 (or even Office 2002 or 2000), download and install the Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint File Formats. You'll be able to open, edit, save, and create the newer x formats.

And yes, the newer formats have their advantages. For one thing, the files are smaller, since the x formats have lossless compression built in. As a general rule, .docx files are about half the size of .doc files with the same content, and I've seen some less than a quarter of the size, making it easier to email or backup the files. According to Microsoft, they're also more secure and recoverable, although I haven't seen evidence of this with my own eyes.

They're also designed to be easily supported by other, non-Microsoft programs. In fact, they're made up of existing, open file formats. If you don't believe me, try this: Rename a .docx file, changing the extension to .zip. Then double-click it.

Yes, a .docx file is really a .zip archive (I told you it was compressed). Most of what you find inside are .xml files--another open standard. That experiment will also work on .xlsx and .pptx files.

After you're done experimenting, don't forget to change the extension back to .docx.

View: Original Article

[calguyhunk]

LOL! This is new. Never realized that docx was really zipped docs behind all that jazz :tehe:

Is a PITA having to save everything as doc though (use 2010). More cumbersome and space consuming. Even with this release, we'll prolly have to keep up the charade of using doc/xls etc. 'cuz not everybody is gonna install those packs methinks and even the ones whose IT depts. finally do take the plunge, it'll prolly take months if not more to roll out the update :(

In the meanwhile, it's really in my own interest that my documents are accessible to one and all :yes:

But it's nice to know though, that MS for once hasn't forgotten older software users - even the 10 year old Office 2003. You'd have expected them to say - well, too bad but that's just too old - Upgrade to the magical new world of Office 2013 :P

So good on 'ya, big bad M$ for once. Super like :thumbsup:

EDIT: - And thanks to New Hound for posting this. I might not have come across this on the net any time soon. :D

[DKT27]

Surprised me too. Seriously, in whole 2012, I haven't read a single article so informative. :P

[dcs18]

Had stopped saving documents as doc, xls, ppt & pps (around a year ago) - have caused most of those on my mailing list to upgrade their Office 2003 copies.

People need to be nudged towards adopting change-management - the natural tendency is to cling to old and proven remedies which are understandable.

[a2ms]

Actually something interesting for those of you who haven't seen how these "new" format works. The reality is that it is an XML inside a ZIP, but Windows uses file extensions to distinguish among all the different file types. However linux reads the first bytes of the file to determine its type, so back in 2007 when you downloaded a .docx into a linux box, you would see the file manager opening a .zip, which was totally WTF.. Not sure how it works now for linux but it was certanly unexpected.

[JessicaLeigh]

Wow! How informative!

[speedy57]

Thank you for this informations, News Hound ! :thumbsup:

[dcs18]

They're also designed to be easily supported by other, non-Microsoft programs. In fact, they're made up of existing, open file formats. If you don't believe me, try this: Rename a .docx file, changing the extension to .zip. Then double-click it.

Yes, a .docx file is really a .zip archive (I told you it was compressed). Most of what you find inside are .xml files--another open standard. That experiment will also work on .xlsx and .pptx files.

Despite being in compressed formats, these files (docx, xlsx, pptx, ppsx) can be compressed even further by (WinRAR, WinZip, etc., etc.) to around 40% - on an average. ;)

[Shadowx]

Thanks for the info :showoff:

[chilly]

Thanks good article, stuff I did not know.