Microsoft Word

A lot of users seemingly only know how to use one tool, Microsoft Word.

Note that in general, Word export is going to not retain semantic information
that was never there. Many users of Microsoft Word never us a single named style
(such as "Heading 1"), but keep the entire document in one style and override
its formatting everywhere.

There are several commercial tools that either act as a plugin on the client
side to improve the html generated by Word, or clean it up on the server side. 
For example, many "ttw" (through-the-web) editors support cleaning of pasted
Microsoft Word.

* Plugins/Addins/Macros

There are a variety of plugins/addins available for Word.
Of course you or your users have to install them.

     http://www.yawcpro.com/
        Saves better HTML than Microsoft does, or saving as XML in older versions of Word.
        save to HTML or XML (DocBook) from Microsoft Word (97, 2000 and XP) 
	there is an associated online service at http://www.yawconline.com

     TonesNotes http://workspaces.gotdotnet.com/tonesnotes
         is a Word AddIn for blogging (shared source license, C#).

     WordToWiki http://tikiwiki.org/tiki-index.php?page=WordToWiki_swythan
          http://confluence.atlassian.com/display/CONFEXT/Word+to+Confluence+Converter
     Visual Basic script

* Using WordprocessingML

Starting with Word 2003, it offers the ability to save as XML, into WordprocessingML.
	 http://www.microsoft.com/office/xml/default.mspx
	 http://msdn.microsoft.com/office/understanding/xmloffice/documentation/default.aspx
	 http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=FE118952-3547-420A-A412-00A2662442D9&displaylang=en
	 http://rep.oio.dk/Microsoft.com/officeschemas/welcome.htm
WMF graphics are exported as VML. 

Microsoft offers wmlview.exe at:
   http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=19676b18-1bcd-4852-93ba-0b5a203ea731&displaylang=en
which will convert Word 2003 XML into HTML using xslt.

Older versions of Word (Word X for Mac, etc.) do not support WordprocessingML.

There is an open source project to transform Microsoft Word's XML to something useful is:
   http://www.oscom.org/projects/wordxml/


* Using exported HTML

To clean up the messy html that Word produces from "Save as Web Page",
there are numerous tools, including:

   tidy http://tidy.sourceforge.net/docs/quickref.html#word-2000

   Word Unmunger http://luke.francl.org/software/word-unmunger/

   http://www.wordcleaner.com/ (commercial)

   http://textism.com/wordcleaner/ (web service, closed source)

   cut and paste into Dreamweaver MX2004 (special support for fixing Word html)
       http://owl.english.purdue.edu/lab/manuals/worddoc.html

   open in OO and save again

   Microsoft Office 2000 HTML Filter 2.0 
      http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=209ADBEE-3FBD-482C-83B0-96FB79B74DED&displaylang=EN
      http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA010549981033.aspx
         good explanation of what it has to do

Microsoft Word 2003 has "Web page, filtered" which is more minimal.

* Parsing .doc

There are several independent open source projects that parse Microsoft Word files.

  abiword http://www.abisource.com
    GPL C/C++.
    command line: 
       abiword -to txt file.doc  
       abiword -to html file.doc  
    While AbiWord uses wv and libwmf2, it supplies command-line conversion that is superior to wv,
    at least for HTML. For example, it generates HTML using CSS, while wvHtml does not.
    Also it supports  footnotes, endnotes, headers, footers, and floating text frames:
       http://www.abisource.com/lxr/source/abi/src/wp/impexp/xp/ie_imp_MsWord_97.cpp
       http://www.abisource.com/lxr/source/abi/src/wp/impexp/xp/ie_exp_HTML.cpp
    Note that AbiSource has their own CVS: 
       http://www.abisource.com/lxr/source/wv/
       http://www.abisource.com/bonsai/cvsquery.cgi

  wvware http://wvware.sourceforge.net/
    GPL C (libwmf is LGPL) 
    Caolan McNamara ( http://www.skynet.ie/~caolan/  http://blogs.linux.ie/caolan/ ) started; he now works for RedHat and formerly for Sun on StarOffice.
    now maintained by Dominic Lachowicz ( http://www.advogato.org/person/cinamod/ ) who works for AbiSource, and formerly for Appligent.
    several different libraries:
      wv is a library and command line utility used by abiword
         includes a copy of libole2: 
	    http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/wvware/wv/libole2/
      wv2 is a forked library (and no command-line) only used by KWord/KOffice
         relies on libole2: gnome libole2 http://cvs.gnome.org/viewcvs/libole2/
      libwmf is used by abiword; reads vector graphics out of .doc and converts to PS, SVG, FIG, PNG, or JPEG
         WMF = Windows Meta File. EMF = Enhanced Meta File is 32-bit. strictly speaking WMF is only 16-bit (Windows 3.x can't do EMF).
	 In addition to being 32-bit, EMF has some extra commands.
         (in CVS it is "libwmf2", maintained by AbiSource; the original "libwmf" written by Caolan is no longer maintained)
    the wvWare command-line utilities work by having an external template file (in xml) that is used to look up macros as it iterates over the data structure.
        http://www.abisource.com/lxr/source/wv/wvWare.c
	http://www.abisource.com/lxr/source/wv/xml/
	http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/wvware/wv/wvWare.c
	http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/wvware/wv/xml/

  antiword http://www.winfield.demon.nl/
    GPL C. 
    command-line text extraction only.

  Open Office http://www.openoffice.org/
    LGPL C/C++.
    source code of filter: http://ooo.ximian.com/lxr/source/sw/sw/source/filter/
    command-line:
      a bit is awkward, requiring UNO: http://udk.openoffice.org/
      there is a http://sourceforge.net/projects/joott a java project which uses UNO to remote control OO
      An example of a cgi which uses pyuno to convert MS docs to PDF 
         http://www.skynet.ie/~caolan/Fragments/ooo-cgi.html

  POI http://jakarta.apache.org/poi/
    Apache license Java. 

Most of these have a means of extracting text from a Word doc file via the command-line.

  

* Saving as text

Word itself also allows saving as text in several text formats.
As far as I can tell, here is how the text formats differ.
This is based on minimal testing, but already contradicts official documentation:
  
  Format                         EOL     Charset  Comment
  Text Only                      system  ascii    single-line paragraphs
  Text Only with Line Breaks     system  system   wraps at 110
  MS-DOS Text                    DOS     ascii    single-line paragraphs
  MS-DOS Text with Line Breaks   DOS     ascii    wraps at 110

The "system EOL" is \r\n on Windows and \r on Mac.
The "system charset" is Cp1252 on Windows and MacRoman (aka charset=macintosh) on Mac.
For example, in Cp1252, an ndash (U+2013) is octal 226 = hex 96 = decimal 150.
In MacRoman, an ndash is octal 320 = hex D0 = decimal 208

Some Microsoft Word versions also offer:

   Text with Layout - ans or asc
   Unicode Text - system line ending, no line breaks, UTF-16 encoding

Regardless, paragraphs are marked with extra blank lines.
Bullet characters and smart quotes are among the "funny" characters you have to look out for.
See:
  "WD2000: What Happens to Fields When You Save As Text"  http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q211688/

* Saving as RTF

You can also make Word save as rtf, then convert rtf to html separately.

* Scripting of Word

This is Windows only, and Internet Explorer only

Open a client-side file:

   <script language="JavaScript">
            var w = new ActiveXObject("Word.Application");
            w.Documents.Open("C:\\wherever\\file.doc");
            w.Visible = true;
	    // to cause a Save As.
	    // or w.Documents[1]
	    w.ActiveDocument.SaveAs("C:\\somewhere\\else.doc");
	    // save as html. Office2000 supports 8, which is wdFormatHTML.
	    // Offie XP supports wdFormatFilteredHTML = 10 "save as Web Page filtered" 
	    // see:
	    //    Office2003: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/WordXMLCDK/html/cdkwohowConstants_HV01113548.asp
	    //    http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/vbawd11/html/womthSaveAs1_HV05213080.asp
	    //    Office97: http://msdn.microsoft.com/archive/default.asp?url=/archive/en-us/office97/html/web/007.asp
	    w.ActiveDocument.SaveAs("C:\\foobar.html", 10);
   </script>

Use a spell checker:

   // http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/script56/html/wscondrivingapplications.asp
   <script language="JavaScript">
   function wspellcheck (uncorrected) {
      var w = new ActiveXObject("Word.Application");
      var tempdoc = w.Documents.Add();
      w.Selection.Text = uncorrected;
      // File Open = 80
      var SPELL_DIALOG = 828;
      w.Dialogs(SPELL_DIALOG).Show();
      var corrected = w.Selection.Text;
      if (corrected.length == -1) {
	 corrected = uncorrected;
	 }
      var NO_SAVE_CHANGES = 0;
      tempdoc.Close(NO_SAVE_CHANGES);
      w.Quit();
   }
   </script>

   // Dan Rollins
   <script language="JavaScript">
   function wspellcheck_selection () {
      var sh = new ActiveXObject("WScript.Shell"); 
      sh.SendKeys( "^c" ); // copy 
      var w = new ActiveXObject("Word.Application"); 
      w.Visible= true; 
      w.Documents.Add(); 
      w.Selection.Paste(); 
      w.ActiveDocument.CheckSpelling(); 
      w.Selection.WholeStory(); 
      w.Selection.Copy(); 
      w.ActiveDocument.Close(0); 
      w.Quit(); 
      if (sh.Popup( "Apply changes?\nClick OK to replace all selected text.", 0, "Spell Check Complete", 33) ) { 
        sh.SendKeys( "^v" ); // paste 
      }
   }
   </script>

if mime-type is application/octet-stream, will always be external.
if application/msword, may or may not according to 
   Tools -> Folder Options -> File Types -> ".doc" -> Advanced -> "Browse in Same Window"
   (in at least XP)

The LaunchinIE control will allow scripting without confirmation:
     http://www.whirlywiryweb.com/q/launchinie.asp

Clipboard access from IE: 
	http://msdn.microsoft.com/workshop/author/datatransfer/overview.asp

Embedding Microsoft Word in IE: 
	  http://west-wind.com/weblog/posts/1299.aspx
	  http://www.cse.msu.edu/~merrickm/wordauto.html
	  http://www.webreference.com/js/column55/index.html
	  http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/script56/html/wscondrivingapplications.asp
	  http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,4149,428392,00.asp
		http://fall.cerrocoso.edu/studenthelp/tutorials/spellchecker.htm

Scripting Word on the server side:
	  Perl Win32::Ole http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Mail/Message/perl-win32-web/2284879

TBD what can actually be done purely on the client side.