Google Docs Ditching Old Microsoft Export Formats On Oct. 1

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Google Docs Ditching Old Microsoft Export Formats On Oct. 1

Posted by timothy on Wednesday September 26, 2012 @08:45AM from the file-formats-rule-the-world dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Google today announced a huge change for Google Apps, including its Business, Education, and Government editions. As of October 1, users will no longer have the ability to download documents, spreadsheets, and presentations in old Microsoft Office formats (.doc, .xls, .ppt)." The perils of cloud computing; LibreOffice will probably be the best conversion utility at that point. Apropos: Reader akumpf writes with an essay about the dangers of letting our data and our tools be hosted by the same provider.

46 of 199 comments (clear)

Min score:

Reason:

Sort:

And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 08:49 · Score: 4, Insightful

is now gone. We used it at work because so many of our customers could read what we created. By requiring the strange .XML.ZIP format from Microsoft that isn't widely supported, we, like most people, will have to switch to another product if we want other people to be able to open our documents.
1. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by Jeng · 2012-09-26 08:55 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  If I read the article correctly you can still create documents in MS Office formats, you just can't download them in those formats. So your customers will still be able to open the files you send them, but you may not be able to open the documents they send you.
  
  this means that the search giant will still support exporting into these Microsoft formats: Word (.docx), Excel (.xlsx), and PowerPoint (.pptx).
  
  --
  Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
2. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by ClaraBow · 2012-09-26 08:57 · Score: 2
  
  Your customers will still be able to read the old .doc files, they just won't be able to export the files from Google Docs as .doc files.
3. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by JDG1980 · 2012-09-26 09:04 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  We used it at work because so many of our customers could read what we created. By requiring the strange .XML.ZIP format from Microsoft that isn't widely supported, we, like most people, will have to switch to another product if we want other people to be able to open our documents.
  Are you or your customers still running Office 97?
  Every version of MS Office from 2000 onward supports the new XML formats if the Compatibility Pack is installed. And if you've been interacting with anyone who uses Office 2007 or above, you will probably already have been receiving documents in these formats, since that is what newer versions of Office default to when you save.
4. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 09:23 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  I chose to use Google Docs, because it allowed at a team of us to all view and edit the same spreadsheet at the same time.
  Then I wrote some Python and Perl software to automatically download the .XLS file and generate calendars based on it.
  It took about a day to rewrite the programs to work with the .XLSX format -- I had to do it about two weeks ago, when Google suddenly stopped allowing us to download .XLS files.
  I wish they'd continue to support .XLS files, because there are Perl modules for both reading and writing them, while there are Perl modules for only reading .XLSX files.
  I also wish Google had announced this change before they made it! I had to scramble over the weekend when they broke our system.
5. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by h4rr4r · 2012-09-26 09:25 · Score: 2
  
  You can still import xls, and ssconvert will convert xls to xlsx just fine.
6. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by obarthelemy · 2012-09-26 09:29 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Many people still use the old formats, if only because they already have lots of documents in those formats. Also because there's not much reason to change, and there are always outliers that won't handle the new formats well.
  
  --
  The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
7. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by Pieroxy · 2012-09-26 09:33 · Score: 2
  
  It wasn't really clear in the short article
  Do you mean to say Slashdot's summary? If so, you are correct. Is it rarely clear but often plain misleading or even just wrong.
  
  --
  Write boring code, not shiny code!
8. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by Pieroxy · 2012-09-26 09:34 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  MS Office in JAVASCRIPT? Holy cow, I need to see that.
  Wait... Are you sure there's not a few million lines of C# running on the server as well?
  
  --
  Write boring code, not shiny code!
9. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by mystikkman · 2012-09-26 09:35 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Every version of MS Office from 2000 onward supports the new XML formats if the Compatibility Pack is installed
  Customers send doc files and expect you to read them since almost everyone else uses Office. Sending a reply back to your clients or people at other companies saying, "Hey, install this addon and send it back in DOCX format" will only make *you* seem to be incompetent and a waster of time compared to your competition using MS Office.
  You can convert the doc and xls files locally, but isn't the whole point of using Google Apps to avoid having to have a copy of Microsoft Office? If you need to purchase a copy of Office to read the old formats anyway, you might as well not go the Google Apps route at all.
10. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by mabhatter654 · 2012-09-26 09:51 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  But many places use the docs with VB6. THAT is the problem. First, these are HUGE systems that automatically accept .doc files. Second, after VB6 Microsoft's tools went .net and working with the office formats got a lot harder... You're talking 90% rewrite.... Or buy into the mess that's Sharepoint and hope you can hire somebody to make that work.
  If somebody spun up a Distro with WINE at XP level, DOC and VB6 compatibility some companies would eat that up.
11. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by fm6 · 2012-09-26 10:25 · Score: 2
  
  What, none of your customers can read .docx, .xlsx, or .pptx? These have been the default since Office 2007. And earlier versions (back to Office 2000) can handle them with a simple filter upgrade.
12. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by Draconmythica · 2012-09-26 10:48 · Score: 2
  
  Only isn't what's happening at all. You can read still the .doc they send you without any issues. You can even create a .doc on your computer and upload it to Docs and send it to someone. You just won't be able to take a file on Docs and then save it to your computer as a .doc which admittedly there are uses for but they're definitely a minority.
13. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by mspohr · 2012-09-26 11:08 · Score: 2
  
  Do you mean that your customers can't read any docx or xlsx files they receive from anyone?
  I really find that hard to believe. For at least the last 5 years, everyone has been sending around these new file formats... your customers must be flying blind...
  
  --
  I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
14. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by ssam · 2012-09-26 11:24 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  libreoffice does a hybrid PDF, that embeds the ODF file as well. so when you import it back into libreoffice everything is preserved.
15. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by anubi · 2012-09-26 11:42 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  Thanks. That is the first thing I thought too when I saw this topic under discussion.
  
  I have been working in electronic design for many years, I started out in CAD with "Futurenet" schematic capture and PADS for PCB layout. Both ran under DOS on 386 machines ( actually the Futurenet would run on a '286 ). I had SPICE analog circuit simulators which also ran on a '286.
  
  I still use these programs today. They are almost thirty years old. So far, I have been able to migrate them to run on the hardware I have.
  
  A couple of months ago, I had a customer I did a design for ten years ago tell me the ADC on the board I had designed for him was no longer available, and could I re-do it to use something else? The files were still on my machine and came right up. It did not take me long to completely redesign the layout to make him a highly upgraded board with the latest parts on it, yet still be completely fit and form compatible with the existing sockets of his product. Thank goodness the PCB house still honors old Gerber formats, and I can still print my schematics off with the old AutoCad .DXF.
  
  This was exactly the thing I groused a lot about when working in the aerospace industry when we constantly ditched what we had always chasing the latest thing. What happens when existing product in the field needs support? And how long do we expect product in the field to last? If our product only lasts a year or so, go ahead and design with tools that are only viable for a few months or so... but if we are designing a product that should last a hundred years, we better use tools and record-keeping instruments that will also be usable a hundred years from now. For hundreds of years, paper and ink worked fine as a storage medium. I can't say the same for digital storage - The physical media: optical CDROMS and flash drive, may make it through - especially if we have redundant file integrity and backup systems in place - but will we have the capability to read it with all the proprietary file formats, encryption, and IP law? Anything much beyond the standard public filetypes ( i.e. .TXT ), may go the way of ancient languages without even the benefit of a rosetta stone.
  
  Well, I guess I am about a quarter-way into my design of a 100 year support capability. I am quite confident my CAD system will last longer than I will, if anyone else sees fit to maintain it.
  
  The stuff I did for the Government during that same time frame is inaccessible, as the old CAD tools are now gone. I would have no idea how to resurrect the diagrams to those old RF modems that were done in the old special hardware machines. I guess it was a fortunate thing for me that when they "cleaned house", it was not only people like me that went, our old tools went too - and these were the old ones that would run under anything we could boot up into DOS.
  
  I was able to buy the CAD system I had used for five years at the company surplus store. The software has went from running on a '286, to '386, to '486, then Pentium, and now runs in a DOS box.... I figure that no matter how sophisticated our processors get, there will always be some DOS emulator floating around, just as no matter how sophisticated our technology becomes, I should always be able to find a pencil and pad of paper - because sometimes that's exactly what you need.
  
  ( Oh, incidentally, I'll run Eagle too. )
  
  --
  "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
16. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by rtfa-troll · 2012-09-26 17:04 · Score: 2
  
  This is not simply not true; With ODF the format is completely documented. Wtih Microsoft's formats the documentation misses major sections of description of the meaning of various tokens ("do like Microsoft Word '1945" or whatever)
  
  --
  =~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
17. Re:And 90% of the reason to use Google Docs... by jimicus · 2012-09-26 20:24 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Have you ever used Google Docs?
  There is no such concept as "create documents in MS Office formats" in Google Docs; your sentence doesn't make any sense. You create a document or a spreadsheet, give it a name and that's it - exactly how or where it's saved isn't something you as the user worry about.
  It only becomes necessary to worry about it when you need to get the document out of Google Docs and give it to someone else.
  This isn't necessarily the end of the world because, as Google have pointed out, there is a compatibility pack available from Microsoft which allows older versions of Office to open .docx files.
  There is, however, one minor issue which appears to have entirely gone over Google's head. The only time anyone's likely to use this export facility is when you're sending the document to someone outside your company and whose computers you have precisely zero control or influence over. If they don't have the compatibility pack installed, the generally accepted polite thing to do is re-send in a format they can open. It is not to ask to speak to their IT department and tell those guys how to do their job.
And by M0j0_j0j0 · 2012-09-26 08:50 · Score: 5, Interesting

This is the reason i didn't pick google for my business, what about the customers that have processes that rely on that functionality?
1. Re:And by ThorGod · 2012-09-26 08:53 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Yep! This just doesn't make sense. Google continues to be *the example* against anything and all things "cloud".
  
  --
  PS: I don't reply to ACs.
2. Re:And by M0j0_j0j0 · 2012-09-26 09:06 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  The problem is not the drop, is the time-frame. like i wrote below
  The problem is they announce a functionality drop 1st October on the 26th of September.
3. Re:And by Capt.DrumkenBum · 2012-09-26 09:41 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  I have been saying for years that any company that runs their business on Google apps will end up either out of business, or as a division of Google.
  Any company that relies on an online office tool is not a company I will be dealing with.
  
  All this cloud crap is just the return of the mainframe.
  Remember when Sun advertized "The network is the computer."? Well, it wasn't then, it isn't now, and I doubt it will be in the future.
  
  --
  If I were God, wouldn't I protect my churches from acts of me?
4. Re:And by farble1670 · 2012-09-26 09:47 · Score: 2
  
  i think people would say the difference is that you aren't forced to upgrade a local app, but google docs can just change over night. there's no option to not upgrade.
5. Re:And by petermgreen · 2012-09-26 11:20 · Score: 2
  
  Forcing updates is bad enough
  Dropping features is bad enough
  Combining the two is horrible behaviour
  
  --
  note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
6. Re:And by webnut77 · 2012-09-26 12:21 · Score: 2
  
  All this cloud crap is just the return of the mainframe.
  No, it's not. With a mainframe, it's your data on your disks attached to your mainframe managed by your software.
  In the cloud, it's your data on their servers, sometimes managed by their software, according to their Terms of Service and mined for their benefit.
  Not remotely close.
7. Re:And by exomondo · 2012-09-26 17:40 · Score: 2
  
  Never before have there been forced upgrades or features dropped from applications! Outrage!
  Yeah but at least in non-cloud environments you can keep running the software as-is.
8. Re:And by jimicus · 2012-09-26 20:44 · Score: 2
  
  It's actually remarkably rare.
  There are upgrades that rapidly become difficult to live without (eg. when Microsoft were changing their file format subtly with every version of Office up to '97), there are upgrades that you'd be well advised not to ignore (eg. when an old piece of software is a piece of chicken wire security wise and the developers decide they're not going to patch any more holes that show up in it), there are vertical markets where they don't force you to upgrade but they jack up the price of support for the older version as an encouragement.
  But causing features to evaporate from under you with about a week's notice and you being utterly powerless to do anything about it is pretty rare. Except, that is, when it's a web application. (Particularly a web application from Google).
Re:Shouldn't have used HOSTS file by schlesinm · 2012-09-26 08:51 · Score: 2

May I be the first to say...WTF???

--
My company home page
No need really by goldgin · 2012-09-26 08:54 · Score: 5, Insightful

I make it a habit of installing the free compatibility pack on my office 2003 installations to open docx and similar "new gen" documents. Works like a charm on the majority of documents.
Who cares? by rashire · 2012-09-26 08:55 · Score: 2, Informative

Am I the only one who found this post misleading. TFA specifically states .xlsx .docx .pptx etc are all still going to be available. Thus whats the big deal. See no issue dropping a format that was replaced over 5 years ago
1. Re:Who cares? by blind+biker · 2012-09-26 12:41 · Score: 2
  
  I save all my Office documents in the old format - .doc, .ppt, .xls. I do that for two reasons: backwards compatibility, which matters to some of my colleagues and international collaborators, and compatibility with the version of Office I have at home.
  I guess there are more people like me, that need to cooperate with people around the world, and cannot expect that everyone has paid the Microsoft tax recently.
  
  --
  "The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
One of the nice things about open source by dkleinsc · 2012-09-26 08:56 · Score: 4, Interesting

You never, ever, lose a feature. At worst, the feature requires you to keep a really old version of a package around.

--
I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
Why drop functionality? by jandrese · 2012-09-26 08:58 · Score: 5, Interesting

Was it expensive to maintain this functionality? It seems like the .doc format shouldn't be changing much these days, making it fairly cheap to keep around. Was the difficulty that Google is adding a bunch of features that aren't supported by those formats (doesn't seem likely?). Did they have to pay a licensing fee to Microsoft to use them? There must be a reason to remove them, simply deleting them because they're old doesn't make much sense, especially if people are still using them.

--

I read the internet for the articles.
1. Re:Why drop functionality? by JDG1980 · 2012-09-26 09:09 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Was it expensive to maintain this functionality? It seems like the .doc format shouldn't be changing much these days, making it fairly cheap to keep around. Was the difficulty that Google is adding a bunch of features that aren't supported by those formats (doesn't seem likely?). Did they have to pay a licensing fee to Microsoft to use them? There must be a reason to remove them, simply deleting them because they're old doesn't make much sense, especially if people are still using them.
  I don't think there's a license fee. If there was, MS would have tried to go after the open-source implementations at some point in the past. In fact, I believe that a couple years ago, the European Union required MS to release documentation on their legacy binary Office formats to the public.
  What this is about, I suspect, is QA costs. Having these export formats means that every time substantial changes are made, the legacy export features must be tested. And they have to be tested with a substantial variety of documents to make sure nothing breaks, if Google wants to provide a solid experience. (Businesses would be very unhappy if they exported a PPT and the slides were all messed up because, say, one particular type of vector image wasn't properly ported back to legacy mode.) So Google can't just leave it in, since it might break at any time in the future, and as long as it stays in, it will suck up time and effort that could be spent on more important things. They decided that with everything from Office 2000 on up supporting the XML formats, it was time to pull the plug on legacy export. (Legacy import, AFAIK, should continue unaffected.)
2. Re:Why drop functionality? by aztracker1 · 2012-09-26 09:13 · Score: 2
  
  Agreed, the biggest issue was probably the incomplete implementation, as well as the complexity.. say what you will, but the .(doc|xls|*)x versions are at least easier to work with... though not *that* much.
  
  --
  Michael J. Ryan - tracker1.info
3. Re:Why drop functionality? by MobileTatsu-NJG · 2012-09-26 09:13 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Was it expensive to maintain this functionality? It seems like the .doc format shouldn't be changing much these days, making it fairly cheap to keep around.
  Funny, this is the second time this week I've heard this question about Google. The answer is: Every time somebody makes a change to Docs, they have to test this format. Expensive? Who knows, but it is a cost.
  The real question is: Why is Google running around doing all this cost cutting?
  
  --
  
  "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Why? by lilfields · 2012-09-26 08:58 · Score: 4, Interesting

Is Google intentionally trying to get out of the Office business? Because this is a quick way out. Though I use Office 2013 beta, I still save documents in .doc often because a LOT of people save in the format for backwards compatibility. Then what about existing customers that have to have this function? What a stupid move. Apple botches maps and Nano, Google botches Office, Microsoft might have botched an OS. At least Apple and Microsoft can recover the business. Office software is a tough playing field with Microsoft's behemoth.
The formats being ditched are Office 97-2003 by Qwavel · 2012-09-26 09:00 · Score: 5, Informative

A clarification has been posted: it is the Office 97-2003 (not 2003-2007) formats that are being dumped, and it is
Gotta say, though, that Google takes as much care with their blog posts as they do with their products: everything is beta.
Would be interested to know what the rationale is. Did they have to pay a licensing fee for these old proprietary formats? Or did they just want to stop supporting rather old, very proprietary formats of their competitor?
Note that they also recently announced that they are dropping IE8 support soon, so they are generally being very ruthless about culling out technologies. I guess I can forgive them that - supporting lots of old MS technologies must be painful.
1. Re:The formats being ditched are Office 97-2003 by jrumney · 2012-09-26 13:20 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  What do upgrades to Office get you except the latest shiny icons and a lighter wallet? For crying out loud, it's office software!
  The *ahem* awesome bar. 'Nuff said.
2. Re:The formats being ditched are Office 97-2003 by mcgrew · 2012-09-27 08:54 · Score: 2
  
  Word may not have changed all that much, but it has a new GUI
  Best reason I can think of NOT to upgrade. Change for increased functionality is a good thing, change for the sake of change is brain-dead stupid, it only slows down your workflow and decreases productivity.
  Office 2010 is so much more functional, and a lot easier to use to
  Um, trying to parse past your typo. Did you mean "a lot easier to use, too" or "a lot easier to get use to"? But at any rate, I keep hearing the same thing from MS fans and always ask and never am answered, HOW is it more functional and easier to use?
  
  --
  Free Martian Whores!
Re:Only OLD format, not current by M0j0_j0j0 · 2012-09-26 09:01 · Score: 2

The problem is they announce a functionality drop 1st October on the 26th of September.
90% of the misunderstanding you mean by trolling? by poetmatt · 2012-09-26 09:12 · Score: 2

Considering that you can still put microsoft docs into google docs, this isn't a change. They're just not sending it back out into those formats - which also means converting documents which weren't microsoft docs, into microsoft docs. The issue here is relying on Microsoft products, not a fault of google's.
Could Work Out by RazorSharp · 2012-09-26 09:16 · Score: 2

Now that MS Word utilizes OpenDocument, perhaps it can now begin to replace the .doc/.docx formats. I'm not really sure how many people use Google docs (I've heard quite a few do, I don't know how they do it), but if they have a sizable chunk of users it could work like the reverse of Microsoft's formats in the past. "Save that in .odt because everything reads .odt."
It's kind of risky on Google's part, but if they succeed they'll break Microsoft's key stranglehold on the whole text editing market. Let's face it, it's ridiculous that such a basic piece of software as MS Office not only sells at the outrageous price they have it at, but is also considered mandatory by most computer users who use their computer for actual work.
LibreOffice and its derivatives are bound to win eventually (it keeps improving and will always be free), but the process is extremely slow. It's nice to see Google attempt to cut off Word's life support, which is format lock. LibreOffice Writer is at the point where it could make Word irrelevant - LibreOffice just won't bury the Office suite until Calc catches up with Excel.

--
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Re:I dont trust Google with my documents by Jeng · 2012-09-26 09:20 · Score: 3, Funny

I don't trust Google with my documents anyways. Who knows what they will try to do with that information!

Display relevant ads?

--
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
Re:90% of the misunderstanding you mean by trollin by obarthelemy · 2012-09-26 09:30 · Score: 4, Interesting

Indeed. Only that won't change because Google decide overnight to change the filters they support. What is changing is the trust we can have in online providers not swiping the carpet from under our feet overnight. See my .sig.

--
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
Awfully short notice by Lonewolf666 · 2012-09-26 10:26 · Score: 2

So they announce on the 25th of September that they will kill exporting to $OLDFORMAT in the 1st of October?
No matter what you think of the format as such, that is going to blindside a few users. I think changes like that should be announced at least two months ago, not five days.

--
C - the footgun of programming languages