TextEdit (Panther): MS Word Compatibility!

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dstranathandstranathan
Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
From http://www.looprumors.com:



Q: Is it true that TextEdit now reads/writes files in a Microsoft Word format?

A: Yes. And it does it quite well.



:0)

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 11
    pesipesi Posts: 424member
    anybody have any firsthand info on this?



    if so...
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  • Reply 2 of 11
    buonrottobuonrotto Posts: 6,368member
    There are screenshots in the OS X forum, page 3 of the sticky thread IIRC.
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  • Reply 3 of 11
    inactionmaninactionman Posts: 618member
    Um Yes, like BuonRotto said page 3 of OSX sticky thread. It works quite well, though I've been unable to set it as the default App for Word documents (for quickly opening email attachments). Word always takes over again.
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  • Reply 4 of 11
    othelloothello Posts: 1,054member
    how much of the complex word 'stuff' does it handle:



    -- tables

    -- inserts (page numbers etc etc)



    ??
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  • Reply 5 of 11
    pbpb Posts: 4,255member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by InactionMan

    It works quite well, though I've been unable to set it as the default App for Word documents (for quickly opening email attachments). Word always takes over again.



    So, just remove Word from your drive or lock it up in a .dmg file
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  • Reply 6 of 11
    inactionmaninactionman Posts: 618member
    Here are two examples of TextEdit and Word.

    First, a Word document containing charts, page numbers, etc.

    Word is on the left, TextEdit is on the right.







    The second is a standard document.







    Sorry for the poor quality but I didn't want to screw up thread with giant pics. Full size images be here:



    http://www.angelfire.com/ut2/inactio...dTextEdit1.jpg

    http://www.angelfire.com/ut2/inactio...dTextEdit2.jpg



    Oh yeah, if you edit the document with charts and hyperlinks in TextEdit, when you open it in Word you lose all the embedded information and it'll look the same as the document when opened in TextEdit. It works great for standard Word documents though.
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  • Reply 7 of 11
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    Have they improved RTF input and output?
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  • Reply 8 of 11
    inactionmaninactionman Posts: 618member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Chucker

    Have they improved RTF input and output?



    Pardon my denseness but could you be more specific.
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  • Reply 9 of 11
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    There are problems importing (and exporting) more complex RTF documents, for example with tabulators etc. IOW, Cocoa's RTF parser isn't perfectly compatible with Word's.
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  • Reply 10 of 11
    inactionmaninactionman Posts: 618member
    Alright, I think I get it. TextEdit seems to have the same problem with Rich Text Format as it does with complex Word documents. Formating goes a bit screwy, anything added is gone. Again, it handles text well and that's about it. Although, when dealing with plain documents, TextEdit looks a whole lot prettier than Word. Sorry if I'm still missing your point.
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  • Reply 11 of 11
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by InactionMan

    Although, when dealing with plain documents, TextEdit looks a whole lot prettier than Word.



    Agreed. Word's rendering is full of crap



    Yes you are getting my point. Sorry for having been unclear.
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