WordPerfect Reader for OS X

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baumanbauman
Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
I'm going through some of my old files on my computer, and finding some wonderful relics from over four years ago. Unfortunately, they are all in WordPerfect 3.5 form, and I don't have anything that can read it in OS X. I've tried MS Word, Appleworks, BBEdit, and about half a dozen cheap editors without success. And, I of course trashed all my OS 9 apps and system in Jan, thinking that if I hadn't used them within the past three months, I'll never need them again.



ARRRGH! Anyone know of a reader (or editor) that will correctly interpret old WP files? Thanks!



Matt

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 6
    retrograderetrograde Posts: 503member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by bauman

    I'm going through some of my old files on my computer, and finding some wonderful relics from over four years ago. Unfortunately, they are all in WordPerfect 3.5 form, and I don't have anything that can read it in OS X. I've tried MS Word, Appleworks, BBEdit, and about half a dozen cheap editors without success. And, I of course trashed all my OS 9 apps and system in Jan, thinking that if I hadn't used them within the past three months, I'll never need them again.



    ARRRGH! Anyone know of a reader (or editor) that will correctly interpret old WP files? Thanks!



    Matt



    Unfortunately I'm afraid I don't although I am writing to say that I support your desire to find something that will read old WordPerfect 3.5 documents on the Mac. It was my main work app for years until I made the switch to X and I, too, have an awful lot of material just sitting dormant now in folders for some bright spark of a developer to produce either a utility to transfer the documents with formatting over to Word or RTF or PDF or to produce an application that will actually open, read na dedit these files in their native format.



    Unfortunately this would not be a problem if I hadn't deleted 9 from my iBook but the hard drive space on this is limited and I finally took the plunge and went classic free when Jaguar appeared. So, if there are any developers out there this is an appeal for an application to help Mac OS X users migrate or use old WordPerfect documents under X. I think there are probably a lot of people out there who would find it useful.
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  • Reply 2 of 6
    keshkesh Posts: 621member
    Your only recourse at this point is:



    1) Reinstall OS 9 and use the OS 9 Wordperfect reader.



    or



    b) Purchase a copy of Maclinks Plus, which will convert the old documents into a current format.
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  • Reply 3 of 6
    baumanbauman Posts: 1,248member
    That's disappointing. I was hoping for some freeware piece. Oh well... I guess I'll check it out.



    On the other hand, if I would pull out the old OS 9 CD to boot up on, does that WP Reader save files to rtf? Thanks!
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  • Reply 4 of 6
    retrograderetrograde Posts: 503member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Kesh

    b) Purchase a copy of Maclinks Plus, which will convert the old documents into a current format.



    Funny, you know I had completely forgotten about that utility which I used to use a lot back in my old System 7 and 8 days! Thanks for the tip Kesh Can anyone give testament to how successful or accurate Maclink Plus is at converting old WordPerfect documents into, say, RTF or even Word documents?
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  • Reply 5 of 6
    baumanbauman Posts: 1,248member
    Well, I downloaded an evaluation copy, and here's the read me file... The functionalitiy has vasty been reduced since OS 9 & below. The only way you can use it is through their application, and dragging files into it and translating it through there.



    No "open with .* with MacLinkPlus translation," no contextual menus, no double-click-and-choose-a-translation...it's all in the app.



    Kinda dissapointing. But, then again, since when have I needed this functionality in OS X? It's just these **** Word Perfect files.



    Anyway, the pdf is here: http://www.goshen.edu/~matthewjb/Getting Started.pdf



    Edit: YAY! It works wonderfully. Translates from WP 3.5 to RTF beautifully
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  • Reply 6 of 6
    retrograderetrograde Posts: 503member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by bauman

    YAY! It works wonderfully. Translates from WP 3.5 to RTF beautifully



    That's great! Thanks for letting us all know bauman It is a little disappointing that it doesn't work as well as under 9 but perhaps as time goes on it will improve. Fortunately I, too, don't need it often and just for the WordPerfect files so, as the Americans are fond of saying, "no biggie"
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