WD2000: Differences Between RTF and RFT File Formats

ID: Q198517

The information in this article applies to:

SUMMARY

Two file formats with similar abbreviations (RFT and RTF) are commonly confused.

The difference between these two formats is as follows:

RFT-DCA (commonly referred to as RFT) represents IBM Corporation's Revisable-Form Text Document Content Architecture format. This format was developed by IBM for transfer of documents between its word- processing systems and other systems.

RTF represents Microsoft Corporation's Rich Text Format. The Rich Text Format standard is a method of encoding formatted text and graphics for easy transfer between MS-DOS, Windows, OS/2, and Apple Macintosh applications.

For more information about RFT-DCA, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q96119 History of WinWord File Converters Categorized by Word Release

Q174813 WD: Third-Party Conversion Solutions

For more information about obtaining the RTF specification, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q86999 WD: Rich Text Format (RTF) Specification 1.5 Appnote (GC0165)

Q111716 How to Obtain the WinWord Converter SDK (GC1039)

Q164472 WD97: GC1282: Rich Text Format Addendum (Spec. for Word 97)

Additional query words: rftdca dcarft rft/dca dca/rft dca-rft rft dca rich- text


Keywords          : kbdta wd2000 
Version           : WINDOWS:2000
Platform          : WINDOWS 
Issue type        : kbinfo

Last Reviewed: May 13, 1999