I am trying to download something from an email. It is a Microsoft Word spreadsheet. I am running Mac OS 8.1.
Is there anyway I can download it on my Mac so I can actually read it?
Short of going out and buying software, is there anything I can do? I am going to be running into this problem every Sunday unless I can figure something out, and I’ve run into it every time in the past when someone tried to email me a file. If I could actually read these files, it would be nice.
I have a feeling it may be hopeless, but it seems there are always these neat little computer tricks floating around out there that might enable this kind of thing. So i figured asking might be worth a shot.
Thank you,
Sneeze
Word attachments are a bad idea in the first place, given the potential for viruses. By then you’re on a Mac, so that doesn’t matter.
Anyway, I always kindly request that people who send me Word documents save them as html files, which is easy enough. I’ve never had to deal with spreadsheets, but I think that word will save them as a table. If you need to edit it, you could then open it in your word processing program.
Microsoft Word isn’t a spreadsheet. Is it a word processing document, or a spreadsheet?
Word users can easily save files in a standard format that is not proprietary to Microsoft products. Microsoft Excel can save spreadsheets in various formats, even SYLK which can be opened by programs as old as Visicalc. Word documents can be saved in RTF (rich text format) which is a widely accepted format and anyone can open it.
Have the sender resave the document in a different format and send it to you again. If they are like the typical Microsoft user, they don’t know the features of their program, so tell them to “Save As” a new file and the options will appear.
To add to what others have said, your best option is to decide what program on your computer you want to read them in, then ask the Word user to save in a format you can use there.
Do you have a word processor? Have them try Rich Text Format.
If you have MacOS 8.1, I…
::thinking back::
…you MAY have had the program MacLink Plus automatically installed along with the operating system. Apple was doing that for awhile (bundling DataViz MacLink Plus for free). If that was before MacOS 8.1, you’d have to buy a copy, but you should anyway…but if you have MacLink, you can translate the enclosed document to whatever format you use yourself.
Having said that much…
You’re on a Mac, someone sent you a spreadsheet attachment. You said Word. As others have said, Word is not a spreadsheet. Excel is a spreadsheet program from Microsoft. If you’re on a Mac and you also have a spreadsheet, you probably have Excel yourself. (The market share of all other spreadsheet programs on the Mac is probably something like 0.2 % of the installed base of Macintoshes).
Are you sure it is a spreadsheet? What is the three-letter file extension?
If it looks like a plain white featureless icon when you download it, that is because it came from a PC; double-click it and your operating system should figure out what programs you have that might open it on the Mac.
Sneeze, depending on the extent to which confidentiality and security are an issue, you are welcome to send me one attachment of the variety that you get and I’ll tell you what it is and how to read it on a Mac.