Word 5.1 documents

[pulmon]

I have a number of important documents created in MS Word 5.1 for the
Mac. My MS Word 2004 for the Mac cannot read them. It only returns
boxes. I have tried different fonts, which actually slightly improves
content (changes to letters and some actual words) but the best I can
do is actually to open with TextEdit. There are extraneous characters,
but the docs are readable. However, once I have done this and try to
re-open in MS Word, the contents remain illegible.

Today I had the inspiration to open them in Parallels using MS Word
2003. Mirabile dictu, the documents opened legibly and completely
formatted! I saved them as MS Word docs, ported them back to my Mac,
where I now have perfectly formatted Word docs that are fully readable
by MS Word 2004!!!

MS Word 2004 appears to have the capacity to read MS Word 5.1 docs
(based on the "save as" function) but clearly did not function for me.

Any ideas as to what actually happened?

Thanks!

 

[John McGhie]

As Clive said, we never found out what the problem was with the last
question.

However, I wonder: do you have a Classic environment set up and working?

I believe the filter for Word 5.1 may depend on Classic to work. In Word
2003, the "Import filter" is a vast monolithic thing that had the ability to
open Word 6 documents, and I guess it was too tricky to take it out so it's
still there.

Cheers

I have a number of important documents created in MS Word 5.1 for the
Mac. My MS Word 2004 for the Mac cannot read them. It only returns
boxes. I have tried different fonts, which actually slightly improves
content (changes to letters and some actual words) but the best I can
do is actually to open with TextEdit. There are extraneous characters,
but the docs are readable. However, once I have done this and try to
re-open in MS Word, the contents remain illegible.

Today I had the inspiration to open them in Parallels using MS Word
2003. Mirabile dictu, the documents opened legibly and completely
formatted! I saved them as MS Word docs, ported them back to my Mac,
where I now have perfectly formatted Word docs that are fully readable
by MS Word 2004!!!

MS Word 2004 appears to have the capacity to read MS Word 5.1 docs
(based on the "save as" function) but clearly did not function for me.

Any ideas as to what actually happened?

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, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Elliott Roper]

As Clive said, we never found out what the problem was with the last
question.

However, I wonder: do you have a Classic environment set up and working?

I believe the filter for Word 5.1 may depend on Classic to work. In Word
2003, the "Import filter" is a vast monolithic thing that had the ability to
open Word 6 documents, and I guess it was too tricky to take it out so it's
still there.

I just opened a Word 5.1 document with Word 2004 on my Mac Pro which
definitely has no Classic.

Apart from some font substitution (I no longer use Times) and loss of
the logo graphic, it was perfect. I also opened an Excel 3 spreadsheet
but failed on Excel 1 documents.

 

[John McGhie]

Thanks Elliott:

Not that then I wonder how sure we are that the file really IS 5.1 and
not 4 or earlier?

Cheers

I just opened a Word 5.1 document with Word 2004 on my Mac Pro which
definitely has no Classic.

Apart from some font substitution (I no longer use Times) and loss of
the logo graphic, it was perfect. I also opened an Excel 3 spreadsheet
but failed on Excel 1 documents.

--
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, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]