What is the best file extension for saving documents for the future?

Two further thoughts, if you are going to save as a word doc then save it as the oldest version that supports your formatting. An alternative to RTF is to save it as html all the best urban

How and where do I save it with that extension? How do I know if mine even accepts that extension?

So what I have (Works) will save in these other extension options, (I believe I have seen them but didn't uderstand that I could use them...I'm a bit computer challenged!) and then they can be opeded with my Works as I have it or will open with any computer that has those same extension options?

yes pdf is the adobe format!!beh this format normally it is the most used for text files because don't give the possibility to modify the document from people receive it..so some documents from office or other official one normally uses pdf and for this reason you should down load the reader!!In reality you type the documents even from word or other writing programs and afterthat you convert it on pdf in this way you are sure that your text document should not be modified by other people receive it!!

I didn't know that about adobe. I'll look into that. not really worried abuot anyone changing anything, but it is a commonly asked for extension. Thank you for your help

I'm not realy interested in media usage. I do personal documents things, I have a short story book I am writing but my main concern is I also do professional resumes and need the little extras like underline, bullets etc to make them look proper and "intriging" to an employer. You mention .pdf - is that the one with Adobe? Do you have any comments on using that or how to? I downloaded the program (for free, if that matters) and have had t o usei t for viewing things as required, and have heard you can use it to type documents. I would like to look into that one as Adobe .pdf will probably be around a long time and seems rather universal. Thanks

MS Works and MS Word are different packages. MS Works is an 'integrated' package. That is, it contains a word processor, a spreadsheet, a database and a graphics application, all of which have their own native file formats. MS Word is also part of a 'suite' of programs called MS Office and the other parts of the suite do similar jobs (Excel is the spreadsheet app, Access is the database app and PowerPoint is the graphics/presentation app) but MS Office is more powerful than Works. MS Office is what almost every business uses; Works is really designed for home use. OpenOffice is a very similar suite of programs to MS Office but is made by a group of people who believe that software should be freely available to everyone and that Microsoft have far too big a monopoly. You can find out more about it and download it for free here: http://www.openoffice.org/ . It sounds as if you are reasonably happy using Works for what you do but if you want to work in an office and need to understand about Word Processing, Spreadsheets, Databases and Presentation packages, OpenOffice is a good suite to learn because it has a very similar 'feel' to MS Office (a lot of the functions are in the same place and do similar things to their counterparts in MS Office). Your immediate concern, however, is to understand about file formats and file extensions! A word processor, as you know, is an application which can put text on the screen and format it in different ways (it can use different fonts and sizes; it can justify the text left, centre, right &c; it can allow you to put pictures into a document and add page numbering automatically and so on). Many different people have produced software that does this and most of them have used different ways of storing the information on disk so that it can be opened and edited or sent to another person. Unfortunately, there is no standard way of doing this and a file written by one application won't necessarily be intelligible to another app. Since the year dot, PC operating systems (especially DOS and Windows) have had two parts to file names, one, which can be almost anything you want it to be, is your name for the file (how you catalogue the file so that you know what it is), then a dot followed by (usually) three letters which tell the operating system what application it belongs to. Although you can often save or rename a file to have a different extension, this is just a name and it doesn't change the file itself, so just giving a file a different extension doesn't change the file or make it compatible with something else! If you want a document which you have created in Works to be compatible with another Word Processing program you have to ask Works to save it in another format. The options are available from a drop-down list in the Save As ... dialog (a 'dialog' is the name for the box that pops up when you use Open, Save, Save As, Print and so on from the menu). When you choose the format you want to save it in, it will not only save it in the format (or 'language') of the other word processing program, it will also give it an appropriate extension. If the Save As dialog in Works does not have the option to save the file in a Microsoft Word (.doc) format, the only thing you can do is to select something that MS Word can read, even though not all the information about your document may be retained. Plain text format (.txt) can only contain the usual letters and numbers, punctuation, spaces and line breaks. It can't hold any information about fonts, sizes, styles, whether the text is centred or left justified and nor can it include any pictures in your file. Rich Text Format (.rtf) is an improvement to the above in that it can save basic formatting but it still can't include pictures or tables. HTML (.htm or .html) files are the format used by a browser. It's not really a 'word processing' format but many word processors can save in that format and some can open .htm files (after a fashion). If you want to send files to other people, it is not the best format to use (unless the document really is a web page) because any graphics or pictures have to be included in a separate folder and sent along with the file. The extension .doc belongs to files created by and compatible with MS Word. Some later versions of Works can, I believe, save in this format (and newer versions of Word can read .wps files) but, for many years, Microsoft produced these two packages with no way of making a file written by one readable by the other! If you need to know more about the .wps format and learn how to convert your .wps documents to .doc (or even .pdf - Adobe's 'Portable Document Format which can be read and printed on nearly all computers but can't be edited except with Adobe's own software), there is a link to a free online converter here: http://w-shadow.com/blog/2007/11/22/wps-files-explained-convert-wps-to-doc-for-free/

This is starting to get over my head. I have Works, not Word...what's the difference? Open Office...is that a whole new program? My main concern is having things available to download to send in emails. I do resumes and often the company says to download the resume, but stipulate they only accept .txt, .doc and .html. Mine is .wps so I can't download. Sometiems they have a cut and paste option, but I'd like to be able to do the download too. And for sure, be able to have the resume on flash drive for back up incase I get a new PC or have to go elsewhere to print documents or email them

Do I have to have and Office program to make this work? I believe I have 03 as that is when I bought the PC but didn't install it. Didn't know what it was all about other than office stuff and I had no use for any of it. I"ll have to see if I still have the disk and install it. But as I am now...will the .doc extension work for my current situation/need?

I think that DOC extension will do well in any case ... Its been around for a long time and many suites suport it ..

markmoney - thanks so much. I really appreciate your break down of what Word doesn. It's one of those things, I knew... just didn't realize I knew what I knew! I believe my Works has all those things. I just don't have use for many of them...until now! I'll have to go and check all that out. I also didn't think about having the installer software and being about to install that anywhere, then my stuff will always work. I know I kept it, just not sure where! I have moved 3 times since I got this PC. I hope I still have it. I have interest in PUblisher now that you mention it so I hope to have that. Thanks so much for your help.

Works is part of Word...I thought it was the other way around..Works being a bit inferior. I am a bit "computer challenged" so I am glad to learn something new. Thanks! I think I can use the .txt for my writings and learn how to save as .doc for my resumes and other business things that I need to have the "extras" for. I have these options on the "Save" screen, but didn't know that I could use them with Works.

I want to clarify that Works is not part of Word, but Word is included as part of Works. See, there's a difference in that you could have a Word program without having Works.

ON the plain writing things, like my novel and other personal things, no I don't need anything special, but I do professional resumes which require things like bold, underline, bullets etc. But I am going to copy them to .txt...just in case as that is the only one that I have heard of that I have. At least to start. I want the extras as I need them for the resumes and for other things.

from this discussion, I am finding I probably have what I need..just didn't know I had it or needed it! I have Works, and it has spread sheets, excell, and I think either Powerpoint or something like it. Again, I just usually have no use for so much of it, I have it but dont' know it! But OpenOffice.org sounds like a good place to know about. I will check it out! Thanks so much for your help

I had heard that .doc is a Word (not Works like I have) extension. Do you mean that I can save it like that no matter what program I have? Just type it, save it with .doc extension and not only will it come up on my PC, but most any other PC...as long as it has Word/Works?

I save everything on the C: drive. And on a flash drive so I can take it elsewhere if I need to. I'm just concerned cause what if where I take the flash drive, doesn't support how I saved the documents? Also, with sending email docs...many places specifiy which extensions they accept and unfortunately, my extension is never one of them! No one wants .wps!!

Very informative. THanks so much. I beleive PDF is where I need to be for these resumes. Seems to be everyones main recomendation. I have learned so much from this discussion. THanks for your help