Microsoft KB Archive/234300

= OFF2000: Compatibility Issues with Office 98 Macintosh Edition =

Article ID: 234300

Article Last Modified on 1/24/2007

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Office 98 for Macintosh
 * Microsoft Office 2000 Developer Edition
 * Microsoft Office 2000 Premium Edition
 * Microsoft Office 2000 Professional Edition
 * Microsoft Office 2000 Small Business Edition
 * Microsoft Office 2000 Standard Edition

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This article was previously published under Q234300



SUMMARY
Office 2000 has been designed to work well with earlier versions of Microsoft Office, including Office 98 Macintosh Edition. Together, Office 2000 and Office 98 provide an effective dual-platform solution that enables you to easily create and share word-processing documents, spreadsheets, and presentations.

If your organization is deploying Office 2000 in an environment with Office 98 Macintosh Edition users, you probably have some specific questions about exactly how these versions of Office work with each other. This article has been prepared to address these questions.



File Format Compatibilities
The Office 2000 binary file format is the same as the binary file format used in Office 98. For example, an Excel 98 user can open, read, and edit a workbook saved as an Excel 2000 file, and vice versa, without any conversions.

Although advanced features and formatting specific to Office 2000 files are not visible when the files are opened in the Office 98 application, the underlying data is still available when the file is opened again in Office 2000.

HTML As a Companion File Format
Office 98 Macintosh Edition users are accustomed to the convenience of saving their files in HTML format, which allows them to publish a snapshot of the file and post it on a Web site. In Office 2000, HTML is a companion file format to the binary format. This gives you another way to work with HTML documents--documents that can be viewed on a Macintosh with Internet Explorer 4.x.

Some Office 2000 Features Are Not Supported in Office 98
Although Office 98 programs can open any Office 2000 file without a converter, certain formatting options available in Office 2000 are not available in Office 98, because Office 98 does not recognize these features.

The following tables describe the Office 2000 features that are not supported in Office 98 and what happens when a file is opened in Office 98.   Word 2000 Features Not Supported in Word 98

Word 2000 Feature   Description                 Word 98 Result ---

Nested tables       Tables within table cells   Converted to tabbed text in the "parent" cell

Floating tables     Text wraps around a table   Placed in a frame

Table AutoFit       Autofitting of table cells  Column widths at save time when graphics are included preserved

Table cell spacing  White space and border      Lost except left and right and cell padding    settings                   padding, generally preserved as cell "gap"

Text around graphics Text can be wrapped around Graphics inside cells with in table cells      images inside table cells   text wrapping turned on                                                    move above the table

Page breaks in table A page break can be        Page breaks made within cells               inserted within a cell of   table cells do not a table                    appear in Word 98

Image Properties    New image options,          Settings not supported in                     including vertical from     Word 98 are lost line, horizontal settings, overlap disallowed, and absolute vertical positioning.

Text wrapping break Text automatically breaks   Becomes a line break to accommodate inline graphics

Border and shading  New 3-D border styles       3-D border styles appear as single-line borders

Underline           New decorative and color    Decorative underline underline options          becomes single underline, and underline color becomes the color of the text

Pixels and          The units of measurement    Measurement at save time percentage of page  for HTML are supported      are preserved as measurements for by Word 2000 where images and tables   appropriate

24-bit color        To fully support HTML       Closed match; applies to                     editing, Word 2000 allows   font, border, and shading users to use 24-bit colors in graphics

WordArt as an       WordArt objects are         Remains inline and still inline object       inserted inline by          editable to an extent, default, enabling them to  though much functionality be used for buttons and    is disabled banners

Inline horizontal   Word 2000 natively supports Remain inline and still lines               horizontal lines with full  editable to an extent, HTML functionality         though much functionality is disabled

Frameset            Powerful new tools enable   Frame properties lost but users to create and view   individual documents are WYSIWYG frames pages       saved

FE font formats     Includes document grid,     Close match (for example,                     emphasis marks, and         colored underlines become                     colored underlines          the same color as the                                                 font; enclosed characters                                                 are preserved) except grid, which is lost

BIDI formats        Right-to-left paragraphs    Just as when opening a                                                  Word 98 BIDI document, unsupported properties like right-to-left text are lost, and the text becomes left-to-right 

Word 2000 provides you the option of turning off unsupported features by selecting the Disable features not supported by Word 97 check box. (Click the Save tab in the Options dialog box on the Tools menu in Word 2000.)

NOTE: Although the check box says "Word 97", it applies to Word 98 as well.

By selecting Disable features not supported by Word 97, Office 2000 users can automatically ensure full compatibility with Word 98 users.

These items are also turned off (dimmed on screen) when the Word 2000 user saves a document in the older format or if the default Save format is the older format. These features are shown in the table below.

 Feature                      Accessed Through ---

Nested tables                Table menu

Frames (Web-style)           Format menu

New Decorative Border        Borders and Shading dialog box styles

New Character Underline      Format Font dialog box styles

Underline color              Format Font dialog box

Text Wrapping Break          Insert Break dialog box

Horizontal in Vertical       "Tatenakayoko," from the Format menu when FE UI is turned on

Two Lines in One             "Warichu," from the Format menu when FE UI                              is turned on

  Excel 2000 Features Not Supported in Excel 98 Excel 2000 Feature  Description                Excel 98 Result ---

External data       Data ranges extracted      Auto-refresh, column ranges              from external data sources formatting, filtering, and can be automatically      sorting do not work refreshed, formatted, filtered, and sorted

Indented format     Allows you to create       If edited, reports change PivotTable reports  professional-looking       to non-indented layout but database-style reports    maintain character and cell with various levels of    formatting indentation

OLAP PivotTable and Enables you to create      Appear as read-only PivotChart reports  PivotTable views against any OLE DB for OLAP provider

PivotChart reports  Charts can be linked to    Appear as regular charts, data views in a Pivot-    multiple level category Table                     labels are modified, and value axis display units convert to literal values 

  PowerPoint 2000 Features Not Supported in PowerPoint 98 <pre class="fixed_text">PowerPoint 2000 Feature             Description                PowerPoint 98 Result ---

Animated GIF        Animated GIFs can be       Appear as static images pictures            inserted and displayed in  without animation a slide show and in the browser

Automatically       Provides numbered bullets  Appear as bulleted lists, numbered lists      that automatically adjust  not numbered lists their order in a logical sequence

Graphic or picture  PowerPoint 2000 supports   Appear as regular font- bullets             the use of graphics in     based bullets place of bullets

Tables              Tables can be created      Appear as a single grouping without using Excel or    of shapes Word

Voice narration     Playback of narration is   Bullet point animations are now synchronized with the not synchronized to the original presentation,    voice narration; there is a                     including all slide        long gap in the audio transitions and build     between slides animations </li></ul>

Internet Explorer 4.x Can Be Used to View Office 2000 Documents Saved in HTML Format
Office 2000 includes HTML as a companion file format to the binary format. This allows Office 2000 users to share their work with Macintosh users equipped with Internet Explorer 4.5. However, there are a few situations you should be aware of:
 * Margins are sometimes compressed or do not appear as intended.
 * Table, paragraph, and page borders may be too thick or not present.
 * PowerPoint 2000 presentations must be saved as HTML v3 using the Save as command.

Working with Office Server Extensions (OSE)
Office Server Extensions (OSE) are software components that make it possible for Office 2000 users to publish to a Web (intranet) site as if they are saving to a file server. This intranet is a dynamic place where people can easily use Web technology to share documents.

Office 98 users can use Internet Explorer 4.x to access and read these documents. However, they are unable to take part in shared threaded discussions around documents and Web pages or to receive automatic e-mail notification when relevant Web pages and documents have been commented on or have changed.

Additional query words: OFF2000

Keywords: kbinfo KB234300

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