The Computer Club Newsletter

June 2004

By Ron Uncapher

The Computer Club – "Save As Type"

The July 6, 2004 Tellico Village Computer Users Club meeting promises to be very interesting. After the opening Beginner Basics session at 6:30 PM, the meeting program, beginning at 7:00 PM, will feature Microsoft representative, Richard Katz. He will talk on how to optimize your broadband experience with the latest services and features from MSN, as well as tools and insights on staying safe online. It should be lively and interesting. We may have a crowd, so come early.

We frequently are confronted with the problem of not being able to open a file that we have received via the Internet. Quite often, the problem is that we do not have the program that originated the file. What you must do, is call (email) the sender and ask that the file be saved and resent in a format that your computer can open. With word processor documents, that is easy; just ask that it be saved in Rich Text Format (.rtf). Any word processor can open and read a text document. Rich test format saves only text, simple formatting, and some objects, such as simple pictures. What if you have received a more complex file, or a non-word processor file? The solution is frequently simple. The Save As function is available in most applications. You are familiar with the common use of it: the first time you save a file, use Save As to name and locate the file. There is a third use for the Save As Window. The white box at the very bottom of the window is the Save As Type selector. Every file generating program has one (games don’t). Click on the down arrow at the right of the box. You will be presented with two to twenty selections, or extensions. More complex, feature-rich programs will have more selections than would a simple program, such as Word Pad. An extension is a three character symbol that identifies the type or format of a file. All programs, with which we create files, have a unique extension that identifies the program with which it was created. For example, MYPROGRAM.DOC is a file with a .DOC extension. The .DOC extension indicates the file is an MS Word document. An extension .WPD would signify a Corel Word Perfect document.

These Save As Type selections are, in most cases, the extensions from another, but similar program. For example, in Microsoft Word, the selections include text, earlier versions of MS Word, Word Perfect extensions, Microsoft Works extensions, and others. These selections represent converters that allow you to convert your document to one of those selections. The converters are not perfect. Some features of the originating program may not be able to convert everything exactly as it was created, but the major intelligence will be carried over to the newly saved document.

Note that many of the selections are for an early version of the same program. Most programs are not 100 percent backward compatible. Therefore, if you know that your correspondent has an older version of a given program, it may be better to save it in the format of the older version.

All that I have said above applies, to a greater or lesser extent, to all programs. Check it out on any of your own programs. If there is any question about what an extension signifies, use the program’s HELP feature, or type it into Google.

Those of you who have the Windows XP operating system should be aware that a major update, Service Pack 2, will soon be available from Microsoft. It is a huge update that not only fixes holes in XP security, but also enhances many features and even includes a pop-up blocker. Its size is in excess of 200 megabytes so you won’t want to download it from a dial-up server. But, Microsoft will offer a free CD which you can order. I’ll have more as it becomes available, probably in the fall.

Speaking of security, and since this is Wednesday, isn’t it time to update your anti virus program? And while you’re at it, do a Windows update, also.