The Vagaries Of Things Microsoft...
18/06/07 10:42 Filed in: YMMV | Hints 'n' Tips
• The vagaries of Microsoft Office 2007 for Windows. As you may be aware from previous posting, Microsoft has deployed Office 2007 for Windows which uses a completely new proprietary file format for its documents, called, strangely enough, 'Open XML'.
Essentially, instead of a document being a 'flat' item, it's now a zipped archive file containing files relating to content, formatting and so on - much like a Mac OS X application isn't a flat file like in OS 9, it's now a package of items [ Control-click > Show Package Contents ]. Anyway, last year in the Windows world Microsoft provided Office users with translators that will open the new-fangled file format no problem in even the most ancient version of Office still out there. However, in the Mac world we've just been seeded with beta v0.1 which lists as know issues its virtual inability to actually convert anything successfully, and even then only Word documents!
You can get v0.1.1 here for Office v.X and Office 2004 and give it a try. [Office 2008 for Mac is expected January 2008 and is slated to have a full working set of converters and be a Universal Binary - read more here].
However, a non-Microsoft alternative (!) that seem to work better should you be unlucky enough to get a new Office 2007 file is the free open-source NeoOffice for Mac, which has Office 2007 translators built-in! Go figure!
There are also a growing number of pay-per-use or subscription online conversion services springing up - just Google for them.
• The vagaries of inter-platform PowerPointing. If you're a PowerPoint user at some point you'll strike a problem that a presentation you created on your Mac doesn't display the images when run on a Windows machine, with error messages like "QuickTime(TM) and a Photo - JPEG decompressor are needed to see this picture." "QuickTime(TM) and a TIFF decompressor are needed to see this picture.". Don't despair - there is a solution! This article explains the why's and the wherefore's.
• The vagaries of mis-configured Microsoft Outlook. If you chose to use Apple Mail or any other email client and you receive email from PC-enabled users using Outlook and/or an Exchange server, chances are you might get Transport Neutral Encapsulation Format (TNEF) messages containing only Winmail.dat files, which either won't open or contain garbage text. Essentially when Outlook sends a message that contains Rich Text or HTML formatting it generates the Winmail.dat file, which contains the formatting as an attachment. Outlook is the only email client that understands this file, and so it doesn't play nice with other email clients - even on the Windows platform, too!
There's a couple of things you can do: one is to ask the sender to avoid sending TNEF attachments by by turning off TNEF in Outlook. When Outlook is configured to send e-mail in "Outlook Rich Text Format", it may use TNEF. When it sends in "HTML" or "Plain Text", it uses standard, compatible formats.
There are two options for disabling TNEF:
a) In at least Outlook 2002 (a.k.a. Outlook XP) and Outlook 2003, if it's being used at a business, the following is recommended to ensure compatibility with corporate mail systems:
> On the "Tools" menu, click "Options", then click the "Mail Format" tab, and then the "Internet Format" button.
> Set "When sending Outlook Rich Text messages to Internet ..." to either "Convert to HTML format" or "Convert to Plain Text format".
b) In all versions of Outlook, you can disable TNEF completely:
> On the "Tools" menu, click "Options", and then click the "Mail Format" tab.
> In the "Send in this message format" list, click "Plain Text" or "HTML", and then click "OK"
If that's not possible, then take a look at this plugin for Apple Mail called OMiC, which will transparently handle the errant Winmail.dat files and more! (There may be similar plugins available for other email clients, too).
• Microsoft Office 2007 for Windows and the impact on Macs
Essentially, instead of a document being a 'flat' item, it's now a zipped archive file containing files relating to content, formatting and so on - much like a Mac OS X application isn't a flat file like in OS 9, it's now a package of items [ Control-click > Show Package Contents ]. Anyway, last year in the Windows world Microsoft provided Office users with translators that will open the new-fangled file format no problem in even the most ancient version of Office still out there. However, in the Mac world we've just been seeded with beta v0.1 which lists as know issues its virtual inability to actually convert anything successfully, and even then only Word documents!
You can get v0.1.1 here for Office v.X and Office 2004 and give it a try. [Office 2008 for Mac is expected January 2008 and is slated to have a full working set of converters and be a Universal Binary - read more here].
However, a non-Microsoft alternative (!) that seem to work better should you be unlucky enough to get a new Office 2007 file is the free open-source NeoOffice for Mac, which has Office 2007 translators built-in! Go figure!
There are also a growing number of pay-per-use or subscription online conversion services springing up - just Google for them.
• The vagaries of inter-platform PowerPointing. If you're a PowerPoint user at some point you'll strike a problem that a presentation you created on your Mac doesn't display the images when run on a Windows machine, with error messages like "QuickTime(TM) and a Photo - JPEG decompressor are needed to see this picture." "QuickTime(TM) and a TIFF decompressor are needed to see this picture.". Don't despair - there is a solution! This article explains the why's and the wherefore's.
• The vagaries of mis-configured Microsoft Outlook. If you chose to use Apple Mail or any other email client and you receive email from PC-enabled users using Outlook and/or an Exchange server, chances are you might get Transport Neutral Encapsulation Format (TNEF) messages containing only Winmail.dat files, which either won't open or contain garbage text. Essentially when Outlook sends a message that contains Rich Text or HTML formatting it generates the Winmail.dat file, which contains the formatting as an attachment. Outlook is the only email client that understands this file, and so it doesn't play nice with other email clients - even on the Windows platform, too!
There's a couple of things you can do: one is to ask the sender to avoid sending TNEF attachments by by turning off TNEF in Outlook. When Outlook is configured to send e-mail in "Outlook Rich Text Format", it may use TNEF. When it sends in "HTML" or "Plain Text", it uses standard, compatible formats.
There are two options for disabling TNEF:
a) In at least Outlook 2002 (a.k.a. Outlook XP) and Outlook 2003, if it's being used at a business, the following is recommended to ensure compatibility with corporate mail systems:
> On the "Tools" menu, click "Options", then click the "Mail Format" tab, and then the "Internet Format" button.
> Set "When sending Outlook Rich Text messages to Internet ..." to either "Convert to HTML format" or "Convert to Plain Text format".
b) In all versions of Outlook, you can disable TNEF completely:
> On the "Tools" menu, click "Options", and then click the "Mail Format" tab.
> In the "Send in this message format" list, click "Plain Text" or "HTML", and then click "OK"
If that's not possible, then take a look at this plugin for Apple Mail called OMiC, which will transparently handle the errant Winmail.dat files and more! (There may be similar plugins available for other email clients, too).
Updated: 3/07/08 7:33 AM • Microsoft Office 2007 for Windows and the impact on Macs