File Formats - Information for Students about File Formats
When submitting and managing documents at Blekinge Institute of Technology, it is important that the documents you, as a student, writies and receives are stored in a particular file format.
To be able to read and store files in a particular format the programs you use must support the actual file format. This format contains the material you saved in a way that other programs can understand the contents of the file and view it in the way that you created it. It can, for example, be instructions that the text should be bold or italic. Furthermore, many document formats contain information about editing etc., and who the author of the document is. If a program does not support reading or writing of a particular format, it could mean that it is unreadable and therefore cannot be seen by the recipient. On this page, we will review some common programs and associated formats so that the risk that problems occur is minimized.
Contents
Microsoft Office (Word, Excel and PowerPoint)
Open Office (Writer, Calc and Impress)
Adobe Acrobat and other PDF generators
Applications and File Formats
Here we list the most common applications/programs used when writing/distributing and submitting documents/assignments. Note that some formats are linked to specific versions of the program. To see which version you have of the program go to help/help menu in Windows, then select About the program. If using Macintosh, click on the program name and select about.
Microsoft Office (Word, Excel and PowerPoint)
Word - Filename extension: .doc, Powerpoint - Filename extension: .ppt, Excel - Filename extension: .xls
Versions: 97, 2000, 2002 and 2003, Mac: 98, 2001, X and 2004
Word, Powerpoint and Excel has for many years had the same file format in their documents, but this changed with Office 2007. If you are running Office 2007, see the next paragraph which deals with this version specifically. If you are running Office 97 and upwards, the file format has remained the same up until Office 2007. These previous formats can also be read in Office 2007.
The Office 97 format can be read by other programs such as Open Office, WordPad (included with Windows), Pages (Mac). For more information about converters and viewers for this file format for PCs and Macs see the following web page from Microsoft.
Office Online File Converters and Viewers
Word 2007 - Filename extension: .docx, Excel 2007 - Filename extension: .xlsx, PowerPoint 2007 - Filename extension: .pptx
In the latest version of Microsoft Office (Word 2007, Excel 2007, PowerPoint 2007) there is a new file format. The visible difference is that the extension has an "x" at the end. If you receive a file in .docx format you can, if you are using a PC and an older version (Office 2003 onwards with Word, Excel and/or Powerpoint), download the "Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats" (link found at the end of paragraph).
A little extra care is required when sending files in this format because it is possible that the receiver cannot read or work with the files in the same way as you can on your computer. One way to avoid this problem is to choose save as in the title file and choose to save as the previous file format for office documents. Another option, if the file only is to be distributed and not modified, is to send it as a PDF file.
Download Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel and PowerPoint 2007 file formats
Open Office (Writer, Calc and Impress)
OpenOffice is a free alternative to Microsoft Office. The programs Writer (Word), Calc (Excel) and Impress (Powerpoint) have their counterparts in the applications Microsoft delivers in its package. The difference is that OpenOffice is free and available to more platforms. Both the program code and the file format is open.
The programs are built on the same basis and have almost the same functionality. Read more on the website of NeoOffice. You can also save documents in the Microsoft Office 97 format and a host of others too. Another great feature is that you can easily export files to the PDF format through the built-in PDF generator. With OpenOffice you get an easy tool to directly create PDF files, which are generally small and flexible and can be read by anyone with a PDF reader installed.
However, to open these documents in Microsoft Office a plugin is required. A project dealing with this has been created by voluntary organizations, and you can download and learn more about their work on their site.
Download OpenXML/ODF Translator Add-in for Office
Adobe Acrobat and other PDF Generators
The PDF format can be used to distribute information which is not intended for modification by the recipient. Lab documents and written exams is distributed by many teachers in this format. You can, as a student, read these documents with a so-called PDF reader. In some operating systems, there is a built-in reader for PDF files such as MacOS X.
Go to PDF-creator (open source)
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