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Just purchased new iMAC computer. Put Microsoft Office for mac on it. However, my old Word files extension is .doc (Word 2004) and the new Word software (version 15.4.0) does not open them. How do I safely convert the old Word files (x.doc ) to x.docx ?
Thanks,
Dave
Well, its time to download and install LIbreOffice. The entire application installs in /Applications, and do not accept to use a Java JRE. Once it is in /Applications, because it didn't come from the Mac App Store, you will need to right-click on the application icon, and choose Open. The macOS Gatekeeper, and MRI functions will sweep the application for known malware, and then this one-time ritual is done. You can then launch the application normally.
RIght-click on your Word .doc file that Word 2016 for Mac won't open, and select LibreOffice from the Open with sub-menu. Once the .doc file is opened, you can File menu : Save As... . Change the File type to Microsoft Word 2007-2013 XML (.docx), and click Save. Now, you should be able to open this document with Word 2016 for Mac.
I have version 6.0.1 and it works just fine.
Well, its time to download and install LIbreOffice. The entire application installs in /Applications, and do not accept to use a Java JRE. Once it is in /Applications, because it didn't come from the Mac App Store, you will need to right-click on the application icon, and choose Open. The macOS Gatekeeper, and MRI functions will sweep the application for known malware, and then this one-time ritual is done. You can then launch the application normally.
RIght-click on your Word .doc file that Word 2016 for Mac won't open, and select LibreOffice from the Open with sub-menu. Once the .doc file is opened, you can File menu : Save As... . Change the File type to Microsoft Word 2007-2013 XML (.docx), and click Save. Now, you should be able to open this document with Word 2016 for Mac.
I have version 6.0.1 and it works just fine.
Word will open both the older .doc type and the newer .docx type. If Word is not opening the documents then there is something wrong with the document. Try just renaming the documents from whatever.doc to whatever.docx.
Please be aware of this if you are not already familiar with it:
Microsoft Office support for macOS 10.13 High Sierra - Office Support
Bob,
I just tried your idea of adding an 'x'. It didn'w work. I got the message "Word can't openthe file . because the file format does not match the file extension."
I will go look at your link now.
Thanks.
don't alter the extension then the program expect it to be the new format
newer word versions should be perfectly cable of opening all older word formats
as would the free libreoffice and apples office programs
There have been occasions during my career track, when MS Word would not open an obvious Word document, but StarOffice/OpenOffice/LibreOffice opened the document correctly.
And who called that meeting, anyway… 😉
OK !!!
I downloaded and installed LibreOffice software. The install worked just fine. I then attempted to open some x.doc files that would not open in the new Microsoft Word program for some reason. I'm very happy to report every one of them opened in LibreOffice and I was able to save them as x.docx documents. And then reopen them in Word.
The only thing now is I have a lot more files to process this way and I don't see a way to batch them.
Thanks again VikingOSX. I'm off and running.
Dave
LibreOffice has a command-line feature that would allow you to specify wild-card (*.doc) files on the command-line, and write their *.docx counterparts into the current working directory, or a designated directory location. This all runs headless in the Terminal, so LibreOffice itself is never seen on the screen.
Here is the Bash function that I have declared in my ~/.bashrc file that gets loaded via ~/.bash_profile each time I launch Terminal.
Bash function (Scrollable)
to_docx () { for file in "$@" ; do if [ -s $file ]; then /Applications/LibreOffice.app/Contents/MacOS/soffice --headless --convert-to docx:"MS Word 2007 XML" "${file}" else printf "\n%s\n\n" ">>> $file not found or zero length." continue fi done }
There is another option to soffice which is --outdir (e.g. --outdir ~/Desktop) which should be the last entry before the input file (which also can be (~) relative addressing). So, whether you want a Bash shell function, or transplant the code into a Bash script or a drag & drop Automator application (Run Shell Script) — this should help you automate the conversion of .doc to .docx.
In my .bash_profile:
[[ -s ~/.bashrc ]] && source ~/.bashrc
WOW VikingOSX,
That last post went over my head like a speeding bullet....
But thanks very much, you got me started. I have proceeded with the emails and all is working well.
Plus, now that I know how, I don't need to do them all now. There are some that I will probably never open again.
Thanks,
Dave
Word 2016 should not have any problem at all opening older Word documents.
You may want to contact Microsoft or post in their forums for assistance.
The .doc and .docx document formats are binary, and compressed-zip archive respectively. Apples and oranges as Word reported to the OP. 😉
Thanks VikingOSX. I will try your suggestion later today. Right now I have to go to a meeting.
Thanks again.
How can I convert word files x.doc to x.docx on new iMac
