Microsoft also included the option to edit PDF files in Word 2013

Aug 14, 2012 13:53 GMT  ·  By

The next release of Microsoft’s Office productivity suite, Office 2013, will arrive with support for more file formats than before, through the addition of Strict Open XML and Open Document Format (ODF) 1.2 into the mix.

The application was already said to come with support for opening PDF documents, so that users could edit them in Word and save them in any supported file format they like.

Compared to the previous versions of the suite, Office 2013 will provide users with a wider range of choices when it comes to document interoperability, courtesy of support for more standardized document formats.

“Regardless of your preferred document file format, the new Microsoft Office gives you more options for sharing, collaborating, and archiving office documents. This post explores the details of the support for these standards in the new Office,” Jim Thatcher, principal program manager lead for Office Standards, notes.

Although Office 2010 did offer support for reading Strict Open XML documents, only Office 2013 will deliver full support for Open XML, with write capabilities packed inside. As expected, it will work with Transitional Open XML as well, which supports previously-defined Microsoft-specific data types.

Additionally, there’s the aforementioned support for the next version of ODF, version 1.2, which builds on the addition of OASIS ODF 1.1 to the list of formats Office 2007 SP2 could work with.

“The Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) published version 1.2 of the ODF standard in January. As a member of the OASIS technical committee working on ODF, Microsoft provided technical expertise in key areas of improvement in ODF 1.2,” Thatcher explains.

“The most significant improvement in ODF 1.2 is the specification of Open Formula to standardize formulas for spreadsheets. Excel 2013 provides very complete support for Open Formula. The new Office also supports XAdES digital signatures, added in ODF 1.2.”

There is also the PDF Reflow feature that Microsoft has packed inside Office 2013, through which users can open PDF files as editable office documents.

This capability does not necessarily turn Office 2013 into a PDF editor or reader, but it is meant to provide users with the possibility to access content in PDF files in an editable form through the use of Word 2013.

“With this functionality, you can transform your PDFs back into fully editable Word documents, rehydrating headings, bulleted/numbered lists, tables, footnotes, etc. by analyzing the contents of the PDF file,” Tristan Davis, senior lead program manager for Word, explained.