Generic viewers save the day

Q. I have a WordPerfect file on a disk I brought home to Ohio from Florida for the summer. Is there some way I can use this file, or do I have to wait until I get back to Florida? My computer here has Microsoft Word.

A. Don’t worry, you’ll be able to use this file, but it’ll be easier next time if you either save it in Microsoft Word format when you bring it home or install WordPerfect on your Ohio computer.

But there’s always a way to work with such word-processing documents. First, try opening Microsoft Word and use File ... Open to open the file. If it doesn’t appear, change the File of Type box to WordPerfect.

Corel no longer seems to offer a free viewer program for WordPerfect, the way Microsoft offers free viewers for Office documents (see Microsoft’s downloads area at www.microsoft.com/downloads/), but generic viewers like Quick View Plus (www.quickviewplus.com) will at least let you take a peek at the contents.

Worst case, use Microsoft Word’s option to “Recover text from any file,” which will let you see the text in the file, even if it’s interspersed with junk characters. It’s a good last resort for files you just can’t figure out.

Q. Many times, I get the notice that “this file does not have a program associated with it for performing the action. Create an association in the folder options control panel.” How does one do that?

A. This means that you double-clicked on a file, essentially asking Windows to guess what to do with it, and Windows was stumped. So the question arises: What are you doing with a file that Windows doesn’t know how to open?

If this file arrived by e-mail, the sender needs to tell you what the file is and what you need to open it. If you’re just looking around at files on your computer, curious about what they are, then you’ve got a file that’s not meant to be opened.

Another very common case is that you’ve got a WordPerfect document or a PowerPoint presentation, and you don’t have those programs installed on your computer. Once you know that, you can either buy the programs or search the Web for a “viewer” that allows you to see them. If you have Microsoft Word, it will read most WordPerfect documents and vice versa.

If you think you have the program to open the file, despite Windows’ puzzlement, open the program first, then use File ... Open to open the file.

It’s a rare case when you’ll actually want to do what Windows suggests and permanently “associate” this unknown file type with a program. If you do, you don’t want to take it literally and use the Folder Options way (it’s outlined here: support.microsoft.com/kb/307859). Too complicated.

The easy way: Find the file in Windows Explorer (right-click the Start button and pick Explore), right-click the file and pick Open With ... Choose Program.

Does this rankle you? Do you really want to see for yourself what’s inside every file, even if it’s only gobbledygook used by computer programs? You can download Quick View Plus at www.quickviewplus.com. It will let you take a look at almost any file.

XTim Henderson is database editor for the Miami Herald’s computer-assisted reporting team. Send questions to thendersonmiamiherald.com.