![[TEST] Document Foundation Community](https://communitytest.documentfoundation.org/images/discourse-logo-sketch.png){kind=logo}
I'd like to make LO Writer default to saving everything in .rtf format. The .odf is not readable by people with
Microsoft software, which is most of the world. If so, how? (Running version 3.4.4)
Thanx--doug
You can save the document as .doc from within LO so that "most of the
world" can read it. But if you must have .rtf registered for LO only
then use "Default Programs" in Windows to set .rtf for LO and remove
other associations. In Linux, that will happen differently but I assume
you're running Windows
doug wrote:
I'd like to make LO Writer default to saving everything in .rtf format. The
.odf is not readable by people with
Microsoft software, which is most of the world. If so, how? (Running
version 3.4.4)
To change the default format when saving: "Tools" -> "Options..." ->
"Load/Save" -> "General". Under the section "Default file format and
ODF settings" you can change the default file format for saving.
Under "Document type" click the drop-down and select "Text document".
Then under the "Always save as" drop-down, select the format you want.
I would suggest not using "Rich Text Format" (rtf), for various
reasons; it may be better to stick with the older "Microsoft Word
97/2000/XP/2003" (doc) format. As far as I'm aware, "ODF Text
Document" (odt) is compatible with most word processors (including
Microsoft Office Word), but you are free to use the format you're
comfortable with.
Regards
Stephan
Thanx to the responders. I'm using Linux. In Windows I usually use WordPerfect.
AFAIK, Microsoft can read rtf. Two people whom I recently sent odf to said they
couldn't read it. I'm told by people familiar with MS Word that not all .doc files
are compatible, there having been a change somewhere along about 1998 or so.
(I don't use anything Microsoft when I can avoid it; I don't need the viruses.)
If someone know that MS can _not_ read rtf, then please advise.
--doug
[snip]
Thanx to the responders. I'm using Linux. In Windows I usually
use WordPerfect.
AFAIK, Microsoft can read rtf. Two people whom I recently sent odf
to said they
couldn't read it. I'm told by people familiar with MS Word that
not all .doc files
are compatible, there having been a change somewhere along about
1998 or so. (I don't use anything Microsoft when I can avoid it; I
don't need the viruses.)
If someone know that MS can _not_ read rtf, then please advise.
OO.o traditionally, and thus LO, do not handle RTF especially well
from memory (IIRC images are linked by default rather than embedded).
But it gets worse. The RTF standard is actually a Microsoft standard
which they update with each new version of Word. RTF's main advantage
is that it is text based, not binary. But even reading it as text you
get cryptic short codes that have precious little human meaning.
I agree with Stephan that the DOC format is the better all purpose
format at this time. WordPerfect should also handle this format. Do
not be discouraged by the fact that DOCX is "meant" to replace it.
Neither Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010 produce ISO standard DOCX.
Instead they produce the deprecated ECMA-376 1st edition that was
introduced to the ISO system before changes were made. This makes
current DOCX documents an orphan format with no standards future.
If your documents are meant for printing and not collaborating i would
export them as PDF's. Difference in available fonts on the host
computer means that you can get different numbers of words on a page
from one system to another
HTH
doug wrote:
AFAIK, Microsoft can read rtf. Two people whom I recently sent odf to said
they
couldn't read it. I'm told by people familiar with MS Word that not all
.doc files
are compatible, there having been a change somewhere along about 1998 or so.
(I don't use anything Microsoft when I can avoid it; I don't need the
viruses.)
If someone know that MS can _not_ read rtf, then please advise.
I think MS Office should read (and write) rtf. If you don't have
complex documents, then I don't think there will be a problem. But
adding tables, footnotes/endnotes, headers/footers, pictures etc. may
be a little unstable (you might get severe layout changes).
As regards doc files not being "compatible", I'd take that with a
pinch of salt. Certainly, not all doc files are the same, and there
are cases where they don't work properly. However, as far as I know,
rtf is less standardised and thus usually a little worse off.
If you've made your choice of format (and used it for a while), please
provide feedback to us. It may help someone in future.
Regards
Stephan
FWIW, my ideal setup is to use odf and save in .doc format only when exporting document for someone which doesn't have nor doesn't want (or can't) install OOo / LibO.
My understanding is that non-odf document formats should be seen as import and export only filters. Using one of them as "core" format on which to build one's document repository is asking for trouble in the long run.
My 2 cents.
doug-2 wrote
AFAIK, Microsoft can read rtf. Two people whom I recently sent odf to
said they
couldn't read it. I'm told by people familiar with MS Word that not all
.doc files
are compatible, there having been a change somewhere along about 1998 or
so.
(I don't use anything Microsoft when I can avoid it; I don't need the
viruses.)
If someone know that MS can _not_ read rtf, then please advise.
MS Office can indeed read RTF but currently LibreOffice has several problems
with RTF import and export. In any case as mentioned by other users RTF is
modified by MS from version to version and therefore it is not guaranteed to
look the same in other editors...
http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/LO-3-4-3-Writer-cannot-handle-RTF-document-tt3485447.html#a3487090
http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/template/NamlServlet.jtp?macro=search_page&node=1639498&query=RTF
On the other hand the DOC format has other problems (namely it can carry
infectious macros) and some companies avoid them as exchange format...
Bottomline: if your document doesn't need editing, send PDF, if formatting
is important send DOC, if content and safety is more important send RTF.
I'm afraid there is no perfect answer or solution 
Hi
+1
to most of all that people have said previously.
The best work-around is to give people the link to the download page for
LibreOffice. It is easily possible to install LibreOffice alongside MS
Office. The default settings set LO up like that. At one of the last
screens of the installer it offers to make LO the default program for
opening the MS Office formats but the boxes are all unticked by default
anyway
Doc is not perfect but it seems to be the best one (at the moment) for
sharing and collaborating. Just avoid writing or using macros if you can.
If the person receiving your documents doesn't need to edit them then Pdf is
best. Either way keeping an original in odt is smart. In Europe apparently
around 20% of people use LibreOffice or OpenOffice. In Brazil it's much
higher. Hopefully it will increase elsewhere too as LO becomes more widely
used.
There are a lot of extra wrinkles in the complexities of all this. MS
Office 2007 and 2010 can both read odt but only the older versions. Most
programs can read/write the newer Odt format that LibreOffice defaults to
but are also quite happy with the older versions. So, as Stephan Zietsman
says go to
Tools - Options - "+Load / Save" - General
In the middle in the section
"Default file format and ODF settings"
see the first line is
"ODF format version" change the drop-down menu beside it from "1.2 Extended
(reccommended)", scroll upwards 2 places to set it at "1.0 / 1.1". Now even
MS Office should be able to read/write new Odt files you send them. So,
this should be a good format to keep original documents in.
Also at the bottom of the same section use the 2 drop-down menus to set the
default format for "text documents" (not text-files (weirdly)) to "Microsoft
Office (97/2000/Xp)" or to "Rich text format" but the proper MS Office one
is better. The MS Office one is 1 or 2 places further backwards up the
list.
When you save documents a pop-up may appear (you can disable it but it's
probably best to keep it). It tends to be a little confusing as to which
option saves in the default you set and which saves in the normal Odf format
that is native to LibreOffice (and most other programs).
While most people still seem to use Doc a few try to urge for Rtf.
Generally those few seem to think that Rtf is a safer format, one that is
not proprietary and not dependant on Microsoft developing it. Sadly
Microsoft do own it and their own programs never quite implemented it
properly so that different versions of Word, Wordpad etc all have
differences in the way they display a document saved in that format. This
was bad enough when MS were developing the format but now they have stopped
developing it at all. So, any bugs and problems will remain and if any new
security issues arise they will go unfixed too. MS's newer DocX supposedly
does everything that the Rtf was supposed to be able to do (but never quite
got there). Of course the newer DocX also doesn't quite achieve the
compatibility that it promises either. The 'advantage' with DocX is that it
forces people into buying the latest versions of MS Office. Also since this
new 'Open' 'ISO standard' is implemented differently on each release of MS
Office it forces people to buy the newest version (MS Office 2010) even tho
they may already have the slightly older MS Office 2007 and the newer one is
due out fairly 'soon' (within a year or so).
According to a Microsoft.com link i found on Thursday/Friday there are also
likely to be differences depending on which OS you run MS Office on. So,
apparently there are differences if running MS Office 2010 on Win7 or Xp
(or Vista).
With Odt it doesn't matter which OS you are using. Sadly there are
sometimes differences when opening with different programs but LibreOffice
devs and most of the rest of us consider it a bug worth fixing when/if it is
found that LO doesn't implement some aspect of the standard properly. OASIS
have finally set the specification for the 1.2 but many programs had already
been using that as the default for ages as it took so long to finally agree
it. MS Office stuck with the older 1.0/1.1 specification using the
excuse/reason that it was the last known stable version. Lets hope the
future MS Office release uses the 1.2 instead.
Regards from
Tom
To save files in a format most people in the world can't read is just plain stupid, in my opinion.
--doug
This is a reasonable and reasoned comment. I'm only sending and receiving simple text.
If I wanted to do anything serious, I would go to Windows and use WordPerfect, which I
believe is the best word processor around. I wish someone would take the old Corel Linux
version and update it so it could be installed on a modern system. In the meantime, I
use Linux whenever I can, so as to avoid the malware problems of Windows.
--doug
I believe MSO supports ODF 1.1 formats not the current 1.2 formats used in LO. LO can be set to save to the older ODF 1.0/1.1 formats by default.
Hi
This thread was forwarded off-list for collaboration and then bounced back
as this thread
http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/Fwd-Re-libreoffice-users-can-I-make-Libre-default-to-save-as-rtf-td3529896.html
Regards from
Tom
There are two strategic decisions for you to consider. If you have no
interest/desire to promote the benefits of odf, open your wallet and
buy m$. Any problems you have with compatibility, legibility, bugs,
etc. then become a problem for you to solve by contacting m$. In other
words, do not waste LO programmers' time to resolve your desire to use
LO as a free m$o clone.
As is often asked to m$ fans: have you made a financial contribution
to LO programmers to help you to perpetuate m$ file formats, via LO???
Every time you ask such compatibility complaints, please open your
wallets! Those that want to continue the dominance of m$ should at
least pay for the privilege...
If you want to contribute towards reaching a future when "most of the
world" are at least _aware_ of odf, you should: (a) send documents in
pdf to view or odf to edit and tell your recipients about your use of
LO to produce your documents in pdf & odf; (b) send documents in odf11
and tell your recipients that such documents will be visible in m$o
but the quality will be poor, otherwise recommend use of LO to
view/edit document to high quality.
e-letter wrote
In other words, do not waste LO programmers' time to resolve your desire
to use
LO as a free m$o clone.
e-letter you should state clearly in your email that this is your PERSONAL
opinion.
You are not speaking in behalf of the programmers or of this project.
If it was a TDF decision to break with MS formats then they would NOT have
added the option to save to those formats.
The people that run this project want users to join in (even if they don't
use ODF), not to shut them out.
Are you going to tell companies or governments that move to LO that may must
use ODF or don't use LO at all? Should they tell the companies or
governments that they work with that they too must adopt ODF otherwise they
will stop sending documents?
What's plain stupid instead is using an office suite and insisting on NOT using its native file format (which, by the way is an international approved standard).
Besides, I think you misunderstood my comment: what I'm suggesting is to use LibO/OOo default document format to work on documents, and use the "other" formats when passing documents to other people who don't use LibO/OOo.
Anyway we are all free to do our choices, of course.
The people that run this project want users to join in (even if they don't
use ODF), not to shut them out.
Perhaps you should confirm your authority to comment as a representative of LO.
Are you going to tell companies or governments that move to LO that may must
use ODF or don't use LO at all? Should they tell the companies or
governments that they work with that they too must adopt ODF otherwise they
will stop sending documents?
I have no authority to tell anybody anything, but if a
government/company contract offer states that submissions must be in
odf, you would be stupid to submit a music manuscript and expect to
win. Anyway, your argument is weak; if you want to watch a flash
video, you need a flash player.
I am a TDF Director and one of the official spokespersons.
e-letter wrote
italovignoli wrote
Hi
As far as i can see the only list that disputes the idea of supporting MS
formats is the Users List.
The rest of the project does such good work at supporting MS formats that
sometimes it ends up being closer to MS's specs than MS's products. Of
course that is one of the problems and the LO devs then try to make LO's
support as quirky as MSO's to compensate. So far supporting MS formats
seems to be going quite well.
Regards from
Tom