.DOC vs .RTF

[CommanderJameson]

WHO WILL WIN?

Seriously. I've been looking all over for this and I can't find it: a summary of what features Word will support in .DOC format but not in .RTF.

[zumbruk]

Given that even MS are being dragged kicking and screaming towards XML, does it really matter?

(Just as long as it's an open format, who cares, even?)

[ThePassenger]

It's hardly a competition I'm afraid.

Look at it this way, bog standard ASCII text has been around for years and shows no sign of going anywhere soon. I do a lot of work in .txt files and then add formatting later.
RTF is just a more bulky form of this to my mind that can carry most of the formatting with it.

Even if Microsoft were to go bust tomorrow the Word .doc format would be around for decades to come, it's perhaps not the best way to do things (wrapper + compression) but hey ho. Besides which most things can write .doc, other than WordPad in Vista which has had that functionality removed

[roadsweeper]

zumbruk said:

Given that even MS are being dragged kicking and screaming towards XML, does it really matter?

Good point, I seem to recall the new version of office uses an XML format - is that right?

[ThePassenger]

roadsweeper said:

zumbruk said:

Given that even MS are being dragged kicking and screaming towards XML, does it really matter?

Good point, I seem to recall the new version of office uses an XML format - is that right?

It's kind of, but not quite an open standard. It has been Embraced and Extended.
I'll sit in the corner muttering Kerberos