Review: docx2rtf Document Converter - OpenOffice.org Ninja

Review: docx2rtf Document Converter

Posted by Andrew Z at Wednesday, January 23, 2008 | Permalink

docx2rtf v2.4, also called Freeware Docx Converter by NativeWinds, is a lightweight utility for Microsoft Windows for viewing and converting the following formats into .RTF and .PDF:

  • Microsoft Office OpenXML Word .DOCX and .DOTX
  • OpenOffice.org legacy .SXW
  • OpenDocument .ODT
  • HTML
  • PalmOS DocBook .PDB and .PRC

Once converted to .RTF format, the document can be opened with OpenOffice.org, Word 2003, and most other programs.

Performance on Word 2007 .docx conversion

docx2rtf v2.4 is sufficient for text extraction. I only noticed the headers and footers were lost. A small amount of the formatting was retained including bold, paragraph alignment, and a color change; however, most of the formatting was lost including italics, lists, and a picture. The .RTF format is able to express most of these formatting attributes, so the limiting factor is the docx2rtf software. Others have had a little better success.

This is the original OpenXML reference document in Word 2007:

This is the imported document in docx2rtf v2.4:

docx2rtf v2.4 conversion of a Word 2007 reference document

Linux

Though designed as a Windows program, I tested docx2rtf also on Linux in Wine 0.9.52. It worked fine. Because Wine works on Mac OS X, maybe docx2rtf would run there too under Wine.

Note: my review is based off of running docx2rtf natively on Windows XP.

Conclusion

If you just need a simple, free text extractor, download docx2rtf. Its user interface and integration are suited for converting a small number of documents at a time (not for batch conversion). If you have complex documents and need to retain formatting, try something else such as Office Compatibility Pack which performs well. There are many ways to open OpenXML documents. I'll post more reviews soon. Subscribe so you don't miss them. :)

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There are many ways to open OpenXML documents. I'll post more details soon. Subscribe so you don't miss them. :)

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