Explained: why docx is causing problems for me

I'm a writer, I send documents to clients all the time, and I also have documents emailed to me all the time, mostly to edit and shoot right back to the client, and I have to tell you that incompatibilities between document file formats drive me nuts. Especially this new docx format from Microsoft.

I tend to use OpenOffice so for the most part I don't even notice what format I've opened a document in, and the same thing when I save a document, it doesn't matter much to me whether it's in docx, doc, or odt, but it matters a lot to clients who historically use doc and then discover to their horror that a document is returned to them in docx format.

The difference is huge, especially when the client then sends the docx to someone like a local newspaper or a business colleague who isn't able to open the file. Explaining how to convert docx to doc seems easy but a client who is used to working with doc doesn't want to be bothered understanding new file formats.

The problem isn't on my part, I simply work with the format I'm sent, but the client rarely notices their Office suite has switched format until they see the extension on the attachment, then I often get a phone call asking me how to how to open Docx files.

Of course docx is no different to any other format, but docx does require either the latest version of MS Office, or the patch that Microsoft provide to allow older versions to work with their new format. Sadly, too many people haven't updated their software yet, so expect a lot of incompatibilities and surprised recipients, or just save everything in doc format, at least you won't have to deal with the fallout.