What's New: MS Office 12 To Use New XML File Format

Microsoft has announced that Microsoft Office 12, expected out in 2006, will use a new file format based on XML. Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint will all default to storing files in Microsoft Office OpenXML format.

Reportedly, Office programs will append an "X" to file extensions, such as ".DOCX" for Word, ".XLSX" for Excel, and so on. Files using OpenXML will be compressed using the ZIP file format to include the images as well as text. Microsoft claims the new format will tend to make documents smaller and provide better error recovery.

Knowing this is the first major change to the Office file formats in years, Microsoft promises to make an update available for Office 2000, XP and 2003 that will let those programs read and write OpenXML files, and will make the file format royalty-free so other software developers can use it.

Tuesday, Jun 7, 2005 09:45 am CDT

Tell a friend about this news item!

Return to the article list...