Microsoft hoses user data - again!

ZDNet ^ | January 3rd, 2008 | by Robin Harris

[Swordmaker]

Office for Mac documents from versions 4, 5, 6, 98, X, and 2004 WILL NOT BE READABLE on the latest Microsoft Office or in the Windows version... PING!

Oh, and neither will the older Windows versions be readable in the latest Windows Office...

If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.

[EDINVA]

I’m the average user who is now very nervous. I have Word 6.0 for all my business documents.

[Smokin' Joe]

bfl

[brityank]

Cover yourself -- pick up the Open Office suite:

It allows you to open and save in multiple formats besides its own .odt (open document text) with all the formatting retained.

[dayglored]

Hang on a minute.

I just read the Microsoft article, and I think the ZDnet article got it wrong.

It appears to me that the ZD author saw the entire list of "Word File Versions", and ASSUMED that they were ALL being blocked.

THIS IS NOT TRUE, at least as I read the Microsoft article.

What it looks like to me is that they have blocked files created with versions OLDER THAN 97. The table of -all- file type codes is near the bottom of the Microsoft page. It is NOT a list of blocked versions!

Read this and see what you think:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/938810

[bjcintennessee]

Ping

[Swordmaker]

I just finished looking at the Microsoft page... and it may be true... or it may be false. The page is written in a very turgid and unclear manner. I suggest anyone worried about it try and read the page themselves and see what they take from it.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/938810

[dayglored]

> I just finished looking at the Microsoft page... and it may be true... or it may be false. The page is written in a very turgid and unclear manner. I suggest anyone worried about it try and read the page themselves and see what they take from it.

Well, I'm no fan of MS, as you know... but I can't believe that Microsoft would cut off the ability to read files created with office versions within the past couple of years. That's insane. They might do it by accident, but not intentionally. Older than a decade? Sure, though even that is, in the words of one of Microsoft's own people, "draconian".

One way or t'other I'll know soon -- my users who have Office 2003 have to get at old files created by Office 2000, Office XP, etc. If they're blocked, my work is cut out for me.

[Swordmaker]

I've been reading farther and it looks as if MS did deliberately block some older file formats but later ones are still active. The problem is changing ANY access to a file format with an automatic update without notifying the user of the change. I have clients who have historical files in Windows Word formats prior to 6.0... which are now blocked IF they upgrade to the SP3 for Office 2003.

"All Word files that have a version number that is less than but not equal to
Word 6.0 for Windows are blocked from opening.

It appears that Microsoft has revised its page... and corrected some of the confusion.

The default setting to allow opening Word files is 101... the number for MS Word 6.0. For Mac users, all of the Word for Mac files, except Word for Mac 4.x and Word for Mac 5.x, have version numbers greater than 101... and are therefore openable.

[Swordmaker]

i think it should be pointed out that Microsoft is not alone in this approach. Apple has made it almost impossible to open old documents saved in AppleWorks of ClarisWorks in Pages...

[djf]

Good reason to have multiple machines at multiple levels.
I have a dust covered laptop somewhere that has WIN 3.1 on it.

[dayglored]

> I've been reading farther and it looks as if MS did deliberately block some older file formats but later ones are still active.

Okay, makes sense.

> The problem is changing ANY access to a file format with an automatic update without notifying the user of the change.

Oh, agreed 100%.

> I have clients who have historical files in Windows Word formats prior to 6.0... which are now blocked IF they upgrade to the SP3 for Office 2003.

I wonder, if you open a very old, blocked document in a old but non-blocked version, and re-save, can it then be opened by Office 2003/SP3? I keep working installations of Office 2000 and OpenOffice around for just these sorts of reasons... Opening very old docs in the latest versions can corrupt the docs under some circumstances.

Back-compatibility is a bitch.

> I think it should be pointed out that Microsoft is not alone in this approach. Apple has made it almost impossible to open old documents saved in AppleWorks of ClarisWorks in Pages...

That's a valid point.

[djf]

This is a symptom of the approach used for SDLC, Software Development Life Cycle.

When old software is upgraded or new stuff developed, it is done on the latest and greatest OS and registry structures. Few vendors strive to guarantee that nothing will become obsolete.

I won’t say that Big Blue is an exception, but I will say that Big Blue is way, way, way better than most.

[dayglored]

> Good reason to have multiple machines at multiple levels. I have a dust covered laptop somewhere that has WIN 3.1 on it.

Wow... and I thought I was bad for keeping an old Win95 machine going.

These days I do stuff like that in VMs, though. The old OSes sometimes fail to load in newer PC hardware.

[Swordmaker]

It seems to me that if these file types are unsecure, even after being scanned by various anti-virus ware, that MS could have still allowed their opening with a pop-up warning that they may be compromised... and let the user decide to open them anyway if they are sufficient value.

Alternately, a setting in properties could allow or disallow opening these older files... and not make the user go dumpster diving into the registry, with the potential to really screw things up, to make them accessible.

[djf]

True. WIN/ME choked big time on a machine with 2.5 gig of RAM. Took me a bit of googling to find out how to make him see only a gig.

[Swordmaker]

The REAL complete list of blocked Word formats:

• Word 1.x for Windows
• Word 4.x for Macintosh
• Word 1.2 for Windows Japan
• Word 1.2 for Windows Korea
• Word 5.x for Macintosh
• Word 1.2 for Windows Taiwan
• Word 2.x for Windows
• Word 2.x for Windows BiDi
• Word 2.x for Windows Japan
• Word 2.x for Windows Korea
• Word 2.x for Windows Taiwan

File formats of other programs that are blocked:

• Corel Draw (.cdr)
• Lotus and Quatrro files - .wk1, .wk4, .wj3, wk1 FMT, .wks, .wk3, wk3 FM3, .wj2, .wq1, .fm3, .wj1
• Microsoft Excel 4.0 Charts (.xlc) files
• DBF 2 (dBASE II) (.dbf) files
• Powerpoint files before 97: .ppt, .pot, .pps, and .ppa.

Now, here's the list of Word formats that AREN'T blocked:

• Word 6.0 for Windows
• Word 6.0 for Macintosh
• Word 95 RTM
• Word 95 Beta
• Word 97 for Windows
• Word 98 for Macintosh
• Word 2001 for Macintosh
• Word X for Macintosh
• Word 9 for Windows
• Word 10 for Windows
• Word 11 for Windows
• Word 2004 for Macintosh
• Word 11 saved by Word 12

[chopperman]

I have a lot of Word and Excel documents. How do you do a quick scan to determine which ones will have a problem?

[Swordmaker]

I have a lot of Word and Excel documents. How do you do a quick scan to determine which ones will have a problem?

That seems to be part of the problem. Some have done scans for modification dates that are prior to 1 January 1997... but that may not do it.