Word Version - document creation

[Peter A]

Is there any way to look at a Word document and tell which version of
Word was used to initially create the document?

 

[Shauna Kelly]

Hi Peter

The short answer is no.

The longer answer is "it depends". For a version or two until about Word
2000, Microsoft included a whole lot of metadata in a Word .doc file that
included the version used to create and, if I recall correctly, edit the
document. All you had to do was open *a copy* of the document in Notepad and
view the very end of the file. But if one of those documents was
subsequently edited in a later version of Word, that information was removed
from the file. So its presence may tell you something; but its absence tells
you nothing.

More recently, Microsoft has introduced a new file format for Word, the
..docx and .docm formats. These can (currently) only be created in Word 2007,
but I assume that won't be true for ever. But you can also create an old
..doc file in Word 2007, so not every document created in Word 2007 is in the
new file format.

Hope this helps.

Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP.
http://www.shaunakelly.com/word

 

[Peter A]

Thanks, this is very helpful.

--
Peter Aitken

Hi Peter

The short answer is no.

The longer answer is "it depends". For a version or two until about Word
2000, Microsoft included a whole lot of metadata in a Word .doc file that
included the version used to create and, if I recall correctly, edit the
document. All you had to do was open *a copy* of the document in Notepad and
view the very end of the file. But if one of those documents was
subsequently edited in a later version of Word, that information was removed
from the file. So its presence may tell you something; but its absence tells
you nothing.

More recently, Microsoft has introduced a new file format for Word, the
.docx and .docm formats. These can (currently) only be created in Word 2007,
but I assume that won't be true for ever. But you can also create an old
.doc file in Word 2007, so not every document created in Word 2007 is in the
new file format.

Hope this helps.

Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP.
http://www.shaunakelly.com/word

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

In addition to what Shauna says, if you open a document in Properties view
in the same version of Word in which it was created or a later one, Word
will display version information for at least some versions. This will tell
what version it was last saved in, however, not necessarily what version it
was created in.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

 

[Graham Mayor]

More recently, Microsoft has introduced a new file format for Word,
the .docx and .docm formats. These can (currently) only be created in
Word 2007, but I assume that won't be true for ever. But you can also
create an old .doc file in Word 2007, so not every document created
in Word 2007 is in the new file format.

No longer strictly true. If you have Word 2000 or later and have installed
the Word 2007 converter, you can save from those applications in the new
format also.

--
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Graham Mayor - Word MVP

My web site www.gmayor.com

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[Shauna Kelly]

Graham

Ah, yes: I didn't think of that. So that makes it even less likely that one
can detect what version of Word was used to create a document.

Shauna

Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP.
http://www.shaunakelly.com/word