importing .doc without loosing formatting
 

hello all,

I get a newsletter once a week that is done in .DOC format, and when i get them, i loose all formatting and can't read it. i've tried Open Office, Sun's Star Office, Abiword, and K Office.

does anyone know of any way to import a Microsoft Office .DOC file while keeping the formatting?

is there a program that will convert it to a PDF file? if i try and convert to PDF in Open Office or Sun's Star Office, it makes a PDF of the jumbled mess on the screen.


Thank you for your time and help,

Tim Piazza

EDIT: if it is any help i'm running Debian Linux "testing" on the Linux 2.6.8 kernel

OpenOffice is usually pretty good at it - I know you said you've tried it, but have you got the most recent version (1.9.something)? You might also try the OO 2 beta.

Unfortunately, .doc is a proprietary binary format of Microsoft's so there's not a lot of open-source software around that can deal with it - and converting it to PDF is pretty much a lost cause if you haven't got software that can successfully render it to start with.

i recently downloaded the 2.0 beta for OOo...no luck :-(

yet another reason to hate microsoft i guess

why do they send a newsletter in doc format? tell them to use pdf as a non propietary solution everybody can read...bad style, i think
but here's a link that may help you. they convert doc to pdf online for free:
http://www.gobcl.com/convert_pdf.asp

cheers, j.

j-ray. thank you for the link...but sadly my files are too big. *sigh* thank you for the link though...i'll be using it in the future

i wonder what they are sending. i never experienced any difficulties opening doc in Open Office...
good luck