<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > It is not MS Office cannot read OpenOffice documents format. > > It is that MS can add this feature because OpenOffice documents format is > international OpenStandard, if they want to. > > MS is afraid that if they implement OpenOffice file format into MSOffice, > nobody would need to spend money to buy MSOffice from MS anymore.
It all depends on what you mean by compatibility. I'm not even quite sure about what I mean by it myself, and I'm quite sure that different other people mean different things. For a start compatibility must be defined for conversions in both directions. There is no software, except for the most trivial, that is completely compatible with another product in both directions. Not even different releases from the same manufacturer, although the newer release might be "backwards compatible". I suggest, when saying whether application "a" is compatible with application "b": 1) we first define direction: a to b (generating in a and reading in b) or vice versa 2) then say the degree to which features in the generating application are correctly translated to the reading application to give the intended appearance or function. Usually this will not be 100%. 3) then say the degree to which they have the same functions. For example a spreadsheet generated in Calc can be correctly opened in Excel (I believe) so they are "compatible" in the Calc to Excel direction. But there are significant things that can be done in Excel that cannot be done in Calc, and maybe (I don't know) vice versa. -- Tony Sorry, I don't answer emails - please reply to the list or newsgroup --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
