Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
So are many formats. PDF and DOC (Word) format to name but two. That doesn't prevent them from being practically useful, even if they are not officially documented. As long as the "owner" of the format provides reasonable tools for creating the files, that's all that really matters.
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The difference with the two formats mentioned is that you can still open earlier versions in the latest software from the corresponding company and can expect them to come out as the used to in older versions. There is a limit to that, of course, somewhere as I doubt anyone can guarantee that a Word 1.0 for DOS file is still going to open and look like what you saw some 20 years ago but that's an different kind of "long ago" than what mobi can argue. Plus, I am pretty sure that you could still convert those ancient formats if you had access to intermediate versions of Word as it usually supports import of documents quite a few versions back. With one or two rounds of installing an earlier word in a virtual machine with their respective flavour of windows it should be possible - though definitely cumbersome.