pdel@ADS.COM (Peter Delevoryas) (02/21/91)
Hello, I've run into a problem trying to upload a 1st Word document to my Unix machine at work. It doesn't look like you can transfer something like this which has formatting characters in it. This particular doc looks like this: Hi^^Mom^^how^^are^^you^^hope^^everything's^^going^^okay^^sure^^am^^having^^fun I assume all the ^^ chars are messing up the transfer. I think I have all the port settings right because I tried transferring some other text docs with no problem. I tried doing this under gulam, as well as some other terminal prgs, but no luck. Any ideas/help is much appreciated. Thanks, Peter D.
steve@thelake.mn.org (Steve Yelvington) (02/22/91)
[pdel@ADS.COM writes ... ] > Hello, I've run into a problem trying to upload a 1st Word document > to my Unix machine at work. > > It doesn't look like you can transfer something like this which has > formatting characters in it. > > This particular doc looks like this: > > Hi^^Mom^^how^^are^^you^^hope^^everything's^^going^^okay^^sure^^am^^having^^fu > n > > I assume all the ^^ chars are messing up the transfer. > > I think I have all the port settings right because I tried transferring > some other text docs with no problem. Here's the catch: You're *not* transferring text. You're transferring a formatted file that should be regarded as binary. If you really want to transfer it, use a communications protocol such as Xmodem or Zmodem. But I suspect that's not really what you want to do. Of what use would a First Word-formatted file be on a Unix system? You probably really want editable plain text. There are a couple of ways to get it. One is to load First Word, deselect WP mode (in one of the drop-down menus) and save the file as plain ASCII text. Another is to use a stand-alone conversion filter program; I've seen several over the years, but I don't know if any are currently in the archive. This is a common problem, by the way. The general solution is to look for a way to ``print to disk,'' i.e., create a disk file that is plain text. Many word processors have such an option. In such cases you may have to tweak the formatting a bit. For example, ST-Writer can save ASCII by printing with 0 left margin, 0 top and bottom margins, and no page numbering. Not long ago I helped a friend extract his brother's detective novel from Wang word processor format. Now, that was a chore! A fellow in Australia (praise the network) sent me a conversion program that rescued us. Without that program I suspect I'd still be wrestling with it. ---- Steve Yelvington / P. O. Box 38 / Marine on St. Croix, MN 55047 USA INTERNET: steve@thelake.mn.org UUCP: plains!umn-cs!thelake!steve
pdel@ADS.COM (Peter Delevoryas) (02/23/91)
In article <A230757974@thelake.mn.org> steve@thelake.mn.org (Steve Yelvington) writes: >[pdel@ADS.COM writes ... ] > >> Hello, I've run into a problem trying to upload a 1st Word document >> to my Unix machine at work. > >You probably really want editable plain text. There are a couple of >ways to get it. One is to load First Word, deselect WP mode (in one of >the drop-down menus) and save the file as plain ASCII text. That's the ticket, thanks. Two other people gave me the info also, and I thank you all. I think I agree with someone who previously said that this net is worth a million bucks! You people are really great! I also would like to mention that I appreciate when I get multiple responses. It really helps to solve the problem in case you don't understand what to do even after getting the first reply. I'm going to remember this in case I know an answer to a question and think 'someone else' will get back to the person. Peter D.