Microsoft Works Translation on Macintosh

[Tony Turenne]

I have many students who use Microsoft Works at home and need to edit their
documents at school. Does anyone know of software that will translate
Microsoft Works Word Processing files (.wps) to Word Documents (.doc) on the
Macintosh. A secondary option would be to correctly convert the .wps files
to .txt.

The only thing I have been able to do with Microsoft Word 2004 for the
Macintosh is to "Recover Text from any File," which results in the text plus
lots of gibberish and minus formatting.

I would prefer if there were a free download from Microsoft, or at least a
free 3rd party program. I will look at spending money on a program if
nothing free is available.

 

[mmmmark]

I have many students who use Microsoft Works at home and need to edit their
documents at school. Does anyone know of software that will translate
Microsoft Works Word Processing files (.wps) to Word Documents (.doc) on
the
Macintosh. A secondary option would be to correctly convert the .wps files
to .txt.

The only thing I have been able to do with Microsoft Word 2004 for the
Macintosh is to "Recover Text from any File," which results in the text
plus
lots of gibberish and minus formatting.

I would prefer if there were a free download from Microsoft, or at least a
free 3rd party program. I will look at spending money on a program if
nothing free is available.

I found an article that says these converters were included in a "plus pack"
for Office 2001. http://www.kbalertz.com/kb_276444.aspx

Anyone have a clue if those filters can be used in newer versions?

Is Dataviz still doing translators? They used to sell packs of translator
filters.

-Mark

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Hi Tony,

I tell my students to use Save As RTF in MS Works, and send me the RTF. This
works fine, for the most part. I think they ought to be able to use and
edit the RTF files at school without a problem, and that's better than .txt.

I don't think MS Works is even compatible with WinWord, so they will need to
learn the RTF trick anyhow.

Free Mac Word processor options:

http://www.neooffice.org/
(OpenOffice Mac port)

http://www.abiword.com/

There may be others--I know these two open WordPerfect, which MacWord will
not, but no idea about Works, and no files handy to test it on. Something
tells me I tried and they did not open MS Works files, though--if you want
to send me some .wps files, I'll try again.

daiya at-symbol mvps period-symbol org

 

[Tony Turenne]

RTF works, but the problem often shows up on the day an assignment is due so
the student is not able to go back home to re-save the file in another
format. I would like to be able to translate when this situation occurs.

Perhaps one day Microsoft will change the way Microsoft Works stores files
so that they are more compatible with other products. Apparently Microsoft
Works comes pre-installed on many new consumer level computers.

I don't currently have a file to test, I will try to get one.

 

[mmmmark]

WinWord 2003 will open/save MS Works 6.0 and 7.0 files.

Unfortunately, it appears that MacLinkPlus translators from Dataviz can only
translate MS Works for Windows 2.0, 3.0, 4.5, 95. Not sure if there really
is a difference or not.

Read more about the $80 translator package here:
<http://www.dataviz.com/products/maclinkplus/index.html>

-Mark

 

[mmmmark]

I just had a blast from the past make it through my subconsious.

IIRC, translators long, long ago used a system functionality/plug-in called
XTND. I'm pretty sure that's how the old translators from the OS 9 days
worked? I think they were band-aided to work on PowerPC Macs, but didn't
make it past OS 9.

If so, and if the OP still had OS 9 boxes and/or Classic on any machines,
I'm sure those translators are still hanging around. If nowhere else, I'm
sure they are still in academic circles since I know they still are using OS
9 some.

Might be worth looking into. I used to have translators that would darn
near open anything. It's a shame they aren't still supported, but I think
those XTND technologies were never ported to OS X.

From the FWIW department,
-Mark

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Hi Mark:

The "main" difference is that "Microsoft Works" contains two Word
Processors. The "cheap" version use the Works word processor, which
basically uses the Word version 2 for PC format. Word 2 format is a
command-stream format a little similar to WordPerfect.

Later versions of Works (and the "expensive" versions) contain a copy of
WinWord in the box. They can produce true Word .doc files in the latest
(WinWord 8) format.

However, our poster really needs to fire up Virtual PC and a "real" copy of
Windows Office to be sure he can read these files. He should have found VPC
in the box with his copy of Mac Office professional. If he's on a PPC Mac,
he can install that. He can then go look on the Internet for a cheap copy
of Office 2000. I see there are some listed on eBay for 20-40 bucks.

Office 2000 was a very solid product. Apply all of the updates available
for it, and make sure you install the "Supplementary Converters" pack from
the CD. You will then be able to correctly open almost anything made by
Microsoft

OK, VPC is slow, but it gets you there, and you're only going to have to do
this once or twice a day Don't work on it in VPC if it's big. Map your
Mac HDD as a "Drive" in VPC, save the file out as Word .doc format, then
close Word in VPC and edit the thing in Mac Word on Mac. Faster...

Cheers

WinWord 2003 will open/save MS Works 6.0 and 7.0 files.

Unfortunately, it appears that MacLinkPlus translators from Dataviz can only
translate MS Works for Windows 2.0, 3.0, 4.5, 95. Not sure if there really
is a difference or not.

Read more about the $80 translator package here:
<http://www.dataviz.com/products/maclinkplus/index.html>

-Mark

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410