Amiga Inc. announces new hardware

[AlexJ]

Remember that the .doc format itself is being phased out in favour of the XML based .docx (used in MS Word 2007) and .odt (used by OpenOffice, KOffice and Google Docs).

Both these formats are open (in the sense that the specification is, and supposedly always will be freely available to anyone that wants) so that should make it easier for Amiga office software to be compatible.

Of course there are a lot of people using Office 2003 and older at the moment, but these new formats will start to become more common place.

[Harrison]

In recent years more file formats have become open source. One of the first commercial file formats to do this was from Macromedia with the Flash SWF format. They were smart though and didn't release anything relating to the actual development format .fla though which was a good way (at the time) from completely stopping Adobe from competing on a level with Flash, or smaller companies and freeware developers from creating products that could compete with Flash. Obviously that's all changed now because Adobe just took the other route in the end and bought out Macromedia and therefore got the code for the Flash format anyway.

I'm not sure how long it will take for new file formats such as docx to take off and become commonplace. The problem is that these files are most used in business, and it is common practice to send files to other people in a format that can be commonly read by anyone. This means that it has to be the most basic form of format that can be read by any version of Word since Word 97 as you would be surprised how many people and companies are still using a version so old, or even older.

Thinking back on it, I don't actually think I used the Word .doc format when I was editing a file on both an Amiga and PC. I'm sure I used the much more primative .rtf format and I'm sure it was because we had to sometimes use Macs!

[TiredOfLife]

I did have something that viewed Excel files but have long since lost it.
There is also a viewer for Powerpoint but it os OS4.0 only.

[AlexJ]

Convertor plug-ins (that do both read and write) are already available from MS for Word 2000,XP and 2003 so that could speed up docx take-up.

As for SWF, you're not exactly correct. The specification for SWF is freely available provided you sign an agreement before reading it. As part of the agreement you aren't disallowed from 'implementing software that plays the format'. Hence why they're having to use a clean-room approach to create the open source Gnash SWF player.

[Harrison]

Really? That's changed then. When Macromedia first took over Flash and launched Flash 3 they released the specifications of SWF as an open source format. A number of companies including Adobe quickly released their own competing software that supported the format but never managed to match it. The positive effect was that a lot of creative software does now support exporting projects to swf format. I find this most useful with Illustrator and 3DSMax as I can output files created in those packages and then load them directly into Flash. Although I do tend to export from 3DSMax as illustrator files more as it retains more information.

Maybe this changed when Adobe took over the company. They have never been one to like sharing.

[AlexJ]

Really? That's changed then. When Macromedia first took over Flash and launched Flash 3 they released the specifications of SWF as an open source format. A number of companies including Adobe quickly released their own competing software that supported the format but never managed to match it. The positive effect was that a lot of creative software does now support exporting projects to swf format. I find this most useful with Illustrator and 3DSMax as I can output files created in those packages and then load them directly into Flash. Although I do tend to export from 3DSMax as illustrator files more as it retains more information.

Maybe this changed when Adobe took over the company. They have never been one to like sharing.

The licence agreement still refers to Macromedia so I assume it's was brought in pre-Adobe.

With regard to Adobe not being one to share, three letters: PDF. With the exception of HTML, I can't think of an open format that's more widely used today.

[Harrison]

PDF is an exception I agree. But they did create the PDF format with the intention of sharing the format and trying to make it a standard print based transport format from the start. Something that I think it has achieved quite well, especially since the internet increased in popularity over the past 8 years.

[AlexJ]

PDF is an exception I agree. But they did create the PDF format with the intention of sharing the format and trying to make it a standard print based transport format from the start. Something that I think it has achieved quite well, especially since the internet increased in popularity over the past 8 years.

What else have Adobe got? PSD is intended as an internal Photoshop file format not intended for distributing (and PS will quite happily export to any other image format). TIFF is not used that much any more. Can't really think of any other major Adobe formats.

[Submeg]

Thinking back on it, I don't actually think I used the Word .doc format when I was editing a file on both an Amiga and PC. I'm sure I used the much more primative .rtf format and I'm sure it was because we had to sometimes use Macs!

I send you my sympathy Harrison, you pour soul, can you show us, with this chart, where the Mac touched you?

I am running office 07 and its a bitch because I always have to save in .doc, but I cant use the equation editor unless Im in .docx Gah!