Format Campatibility Between Mac and PC

[Mike5550000]

Version: 2004
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
Processor: Intel

I have created quite a few Word docs on my Mac G5. When I send them to PC users, the format is all screwed up. When I run the file compatibility checker on my Mac, there's an issue that is detected and the recommendation is to change the compatibility preference to "Microsoft Word 2000-2004 and X". The problem is that every time I do this, the preference reverts back to "Custom". The "Microsoft Word 2000-2004 and X" does not seem to stick. Please help; these formatting issues between Mac and PC are killing me. Thanks

 

[John McGhie]

Is this one document or different documents?

If it's one document, it's corrupt: do a Maggie.

The Maggie:

1. Create a new blank document
2. Carefully select all of the text in the bad document EXCEPT the last
paragraph mark
3. Copy it.
4. Paste in the new document.
5. Save under a new file name and close all, then re-open.

This technique for de-corrupting is known as "Doing a 'Maggie'", after
Margaret Secara from the Word PC-L mailing list who first publicised the
technique.

If this is "several" documents, then I need to understand what you mean by
"All screwed up".

If you have any "Settings" other than "Word 2007 2008" in your Compatibility
preferences before you save to .doc, then the settings will be modified to
match Word 2004 more closely when you save as .doc, and the result will be
shown as "Custom".

And those settings are not usually the cause of the formatting being "All
screwed up". Usually, the issue is that the document has been formatted in
such a way that if the compatibility is not 100 per cent, the effect on the
formatting is dramatic (e.g. Using spaces and hard page breaks and blank
lines).

Those last three are the usual suspects, not "not using styles" or "applying
overrides to styles" will result in some unparliamentary language also.

Word draws its measurements from the printer driver of the printer that is
going to print the document, so unless the other computers are all using the
exact same make and model of printer, things will move around.

If you are preparing documents for distribution to other computers, you need
to be aware of this, and format your document using techniques that will
deliver a good result no matter what the printer is.

Hope this helps

Version: 2004
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
Processor: Intel

I have created quite a few Word docs on my Mac G5. When I send them to PC
users, the format is all screwed up. When I run the file compatibility checker
on my Mac, there's an issue that is detected and the recommendation is to
change the compatibility preference to "Microsoft Word 2000-2004 and X". The
problem is that every time I do this, the preference reverts back to "Custom".
The "Microsoft Word 2000-2004 and X" does not seem to stick. Please help;
these formatting issues between Mac and PC are killing me. Thanks

--

Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[Rohit Singh]

I am a Mac Word and Excel 2004 user. I have created some graphs in Excel 2004 for MAC which I export into a Word for Mac 2004 file with no problem.

When I send the Mac 2004 word file to a windows office 2003 program on a PC, the graphs do not appear to be formatted correctly. Bits of the title are missing and the legend is cut off. This happens consistently. What can I do?

 

[Catherine]

Please help...!

We were told that the NEW MSOFFICE for MAC 08 - PowerPoint...is compatible with the MSOffice 07 PPT (PC)....HOWEVER - it has not shown to be the case...

Please tell me what to do to make the files compatible across both platforms...?!

 

[CyberTaz]

You've not only jumped into a thread on a completely different issue but
this is the newsgroup for Word, not PPt

Please post to the PPt group: microsoft.public.mac.office.powerpoint

And be certain to include your exact versions of OS X & Office as well as
basic specs of your Mac. You'll also need to be more specific about what it
is that you're perceiving as 'compatibility' issues. The program uses the
exact same file format on both platforms, but there are some differences in
the applications as well as some Mac v. Windows considerations. Without
details it's impossible to "guess" what you might be experiencing.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Rohit:

Generically, the answer is "Leave more space".

Going from Mac to PC, things will move around a little in the 2004 versions.
You need to expect this and leave room so that it does not matter when it
happens.

Microsoft is putting an effort into trying to resolve these annoyances in
the next version of Office (2010).

Cheers

I am a Mac Word and Excel 2004 user. I have created some graphs in Excel 2004
for MAC which I export into a Word for Mac 2004 file with no problem.

When I send the Mac 2004 word file to a windows office 2003 program on a PC,
the graphs do not appear to be formatted correctly. Bits of the title are
missing and the legend is cut off. This happens consistently. What can I do?

--

Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[Phillip Jones]

Isn't part of the problem been That Dot pattern if you will for better
description is based on 72dpi on Mac and PC is either 96dpi typically or
100.

that is the area set up for drawing character is based on a 9 by 8
pattern on Mac and 9 by 12 on PC. so That a 12 pt Font on a PC looks
like a 9 pt font on a Mac (72/96) and a 12 pt font will (size based on
96/72) be something like 16pt roughly?

also On PC's letters are made up of filled in Blocks, where Mac use
round dots within those blocks.

.......... .........
.......... .........
.......... .........
.......... .........
.......... .........
.......... .........
.......... .........
.......... .........
.........
.........
.........
.........

Hi Rohit:

Generically, the answer is "Leave more space".

Going from Mac to PC, things will move around a little in the 2004 versions.
You need to expect this and leave room so that it does not matter when it
happens.

Microsoft is putting an effort into trying to resolve these annoyances in
the next version of Office (2010).

Cheers

--
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616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
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[John McGhie]

Hi Phillip:

Sort of

The old 72/96 dpi argument should have gone away by now, because either
machine can use "anything you like". Typically, the larger the monitor, the
more likely it is to be using a lower value, the smaller the monitor, the
higher the "dpi" value.

To put that another way: if you display a square of 72 or 96 pixels, it
won't measure an "inch" on "anything" these days.

Old bitmap fonts were adjusted to the fact that on the old Mac Character
displays each character was 12 x 12, where on the PC it was 16 x 9 (I think:
I can't remember the exact measures). So the Mac had "square" characters
and the PC had "oblong" characters.

Again, this has all gone away: modern fonts contain mathematical formulae
for each character, not pictures. So the modern graphics card will
determine how many pixels to light, depending on the chosen magnification of
the display.

In the old days of monochrome CRT monitors, the pixels were indeed "round".
Then came colour, where the pixels were either oblong or triangular. Now
with LCD and plasma displays, the pixels are normally "square"

Hope this helps

Isn't part of the problem been That Dot pattern if you will for better
description is based on 72dpi on Mac and PC is either 96dpi typically or
100.

that is the area set up for drawing character is based on a 9 by 8
pattern on Mac and 9 by 12 on PC. so That a 12 pt Font on a PC looks
like a 9 pt font on a Mac (72/96) and a 12 pt font will (size based on
96/72) be something like 16pt roughly?

also On PC's letters are made up of filled in Blocks, where Mac use
round dots within those blocks.

......... .........

......... .........

......... .........

......... .........

......... .........

......... .........

......... .........

......... .........

.........
.........
.........
.........

--

Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]