MS Office 2010 not opening .doc files

From previous posts elsewhere it is said:

STARTS

Microsoft Office 2010 will complain that ODF 1.2 and extended documents written by LibreOffice 3.5 are invalid (but opens them still). This is a shortcoming in MSO2010 only supporting ODF 1.1, please see here for further details

http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/ReleaseNotes/3.5#ODF_1.2_Conforming_Document

ENDS

This solution has solved my problem in saving in .odt format. Many thanks.

However I still have a problem with MS Office Word 2010 not opening files saved by LibreOffice 3.6.4.3 using Microsoft Word 97/2000/XP/2003 (.doc)(*.doc) format.

Would appreciate further assistance.

Cracked it. I opened the .odt file in MS Word 2010 which as expected worked ok. I then saved it in .doc format. I closed the file and reopened it in MS Word which was successful. I closed it and was successful in opening it up in LibreOffice. Many thanks Pedro for stimulating a fresh approach.

I’m glad my answer inspired you :slight_smile: I’m curious: if both suites work correctly with .odt why insist on .doc?

Have you checked if the converted document opens in Office 2003? Did you try saving in docx format?

LibreOffice export to doc is not perfect but it produces functional files that open in Office 2003, 2007 and 2010 (at least the conversions I have performed)

Can you share an example of a non-working file?

Pedro asked, “I’m glad my answer inspired you :slight_smile: I’m curious: if both suites work correctly with .odt why insist on .doc?” and “Can you share an example of a non-working file?”

Good points.

I have collected an enormous amount of historical information on families and events in separate files. The data came from searching and translating old documents from many English archives over a long time. No doubt other people could do the same but if I’ve done it why shouldn’t they benefit. I’m often asked to comment on family names and events which I’m happy to do. I’m trying to protect it for posterity. But if I should fall under a bus my files would languish on my computer. To whom would they go? You can’t be sure. Trouble is that most people are not familiar with .odt files because they do not use Openoffice or LibreOffice. They might have old Word or other software which won’t open .odt files. I’ve been trying to preserve my information in .odt and .doc formats to cover these eventualities.

The file in question is very dear to me as it is to do with my property and the families that used to own and occupy it. I’ve had to go back to the 1400s to track their family events. It’s huge and contains many footnotes, inserted images and much analysis. It’s a ‘life’s’ work actually and I would hate for it to become corrupted and lost forever.

Now, every time I update it I convert it to a pdf which seems to be a common mode of exchanging documents.