Re: AppleWorks --> Mac

[dempson@actrix.gen.nz (David Empson)]

In article <320AB428.395D@baldcom.net>, Edhel Iaur <drsmooth@baldcom.net> wrote:

>Paul V. Colvin wrote:
> 
>> What is the best way to get AppleWorks  or Student Writing and Publishing
>> Center (by Learning Company) files onto Macs so they can be edited and
>> printed?
>
>If the Macs will have ClarisWorks, then you can probably open 
>AppleWorks files almost directly.  There's a program on the Mac system 
>disks called "Apple File Exchange".  It can move ProDOS (AppleWorks 
>files are ProDOS) files over to the Mac.
>
>If the Macs come with PC Exchange, then maybe you can read Apple // 
>disks directly?  Maybe PC Exchange only does IBM disks.  I'm not sure.

PC Exchange does support ProDOS disks as well as MS-DOS, but it cannot be
used directly to import AppleWorks documents into ClarisWorks.

The problem is that ClarisWorks is working from an older implementation of
the ProDOS-to-HFS file type translation scheme.  ClarisWorks expects
AppleWorks files to be stored on Mac disks with a type of 'pdos' and a
creator of '19  ' (database), '1A  ' (word processor) or '1B  '
(spreadsheet).  These file types are generated when you convert an
AppleWorks document with Apple File Exchange.

PC Exchange and AppleShare (including System 7's File Sharing) use a newer
scheme, in which the ProDOS file type and auxiliary type are encoded in
binary form in the last three characters of the Mac file type, and the
first character is 'p'.  ClarisWorks doesn't recognise these file types,
so it refuses to open AppleWorks documents converted using either of these
methods.

You should be able to import the documents into ClarisWorks if you use a
file type changer utility on the Mac (e.g. ResEdit) to change the file
type to the values expected by ClarisWorks.

-- 
David Empson
dempson@actrix.gen.nz
Snail Mail: P.O. Box 27-103, Wellington, New Zealand