Downloading Microsoft Word Documents

[brayd]

I'm posting links to several Microsoft Word documents on my website in order for visitors to download these documents. I want to be sure that visitors with older versions of Microsoft Word will be able to open and save these documents. Which of following should I use when saving my original documents for use on my website?

Word Document (*.doc)

Rich Text Format (*.rtf)

Word 97-2003 & 6.0/95 - RTF (*.doc)

[jscheuer1]

I think that you are out of luck with .doc unless you are saving the originals for your site using one of the older Word programs. Word appears to be (from my limited experience) only forward compatible - meaning that older version files can be opened in newer versions of Word but not backward - meaning newer version files cannot be opened in older versions of Word.

The .rtf format however, is supposed to be more standardized so, you may have better luck with that.

[boxxertrumps]

rtf is your best bet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Text_Format

The Rich Text Format (often abbreviated to RTF) is a proprietary document file format developed by Microsoft since 1987 for cross-platform document interchange. Most word processors are able to read and write RTF documents.

[BLiZZaRD]

Or you could save as all 3, and let your visitor decide which one they want.

Or put all 3 in a single zip file, so they download once and choose afterwards.

[Twey]

You should export to something else as well, perhaps PDF or ODF, since not everybody has Microsoft Office.

[boxxertrumps]

rich text format can be used by everyone, twey.
(at least, i can use it...)
and doc formats can be opened by openoffice.

But if you want everyone have the ability to use it, i'd suggest a simple text file.

[djr33]

.txt only as a last resort, as so much is lost in the format.

.rtf loses a good bit too, but probably a good idea.

.html might be a decent option, if you're willing to recode for .html, but don't just export as that since it'll cause weird problems.

[Twey]

RTF is still a proprietary format, I think. HTML would be decent, but it's not ideal for encoding word-processing documents like those DOC is usually used for: the Web and paper are two very different mediums.

I'm still going with PDF.