Hello
I’m sorry if this post might seem slightly redundant but after an extensive search in other forums I would like to get it straight.
I’m running DTPE 1.9.9
Current version (since it is not 2.x) is not file based… therefore all is done in the “old way”
I often take richtextnotes during class lectures, but the editor inside DT often gets lost/fu****up when dealing with tables!! i.e. it would completely ignore one cell and I couldn’t edit the text inside, I can select all and copy the text, but once pasted it would still not be editable. BTW Anyone experiencing the same ?
Anyway I decided to use Microsoft Office for its compatibility with Windows and definitely good features.
I understand that many times tables, formulas, links from Excel, etc inside a Word document cannot be exported properly in DT because of the proprietary format and the conversion methods to richtext.
(on that I would like to comment: when saving a word file (containing for example symbols) as rtf aiming at having it correctly displayed in DTinstead the symbols of the document are lost and one symbol is displayed for all! saving in .doc format and importing in DT it actually works!) weird!!
Since the doc formats are only externally linked and the available file is a temporary preview we have only a few possible solutions to overcome that:
- index rather than import
- create a “mywordfiles” folder inside DT folder in application where I would have to re-save all Word files after editing and prior to importing again in the database.
- copy and paste the TEXT of the file in a new richtext (so the text is searchable) and then drop inside the text itself the word document which will automatically be added in the files forlder inside application support. the icon is actually nothing more than a link, right?
Instead .xls files ( Microsoft Excel) are read as unknown format. they reside in the files folder within application support. They are not searchable because they cannot be read but once opened they open directly in excel and saves made there are immediately in DT because changes are made to the file residing in the inside file folder of DT. The same is true for other graphical apps and all not supported formats.
Now when the incorrect behaviour of the import makes a doc file useless the only option would be one of the ones listed above since there is no option to import it as a unknown format anylonger… right?
To of all of that… add a two way sync with Chronosync that automatically syncs the DT application support folder between my computers.
In light of what I wrote what could be the best solution?
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indexing doesn’t allow for searching within the docs but it’s easier to deal with the files and changes to those
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the “mywordfiles” folder would avoid having documents spread around the computer and they would be synchronized. but it implies a manual reimporting process each time for the changes made. and it might happen that the document is not displayed correctly in the preview
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having the files inside the text itself has the same advantages and disadvantages as above (except the conversion that is not performed) but it has bad implications when exporting the database since it will become a rtdf file.
I’m sorry this is a long post and I appreciate the reader’s effort and any help.
Thank You
Marco