Working on a Macintosh, saving for Windows users

Whenever you are thinking about universal access, there are a number of things to pay attention to. A few specific tips for Macintosh users:

Pages is a word processing program that is part of the iWorks suite on Macintosh computers. It saves files in a proprietary format automatically, but can also export as Word and Rich Text Format files.

Including extensions - One of the options when saving on a Macintosh is to 'Include extensions' This is critical to help out technologically challenged Windows users. This option will show up in the Dialog Box when you select Save As. See list of extensions on file types page.

Don't use 'funny' characters in file names - When aiming for universality, think of the lowest common denominator. I stay away from most anything 'odd': !@#$%^&*()/\ In particular, the two slash keys / \ have very special meanings in the Windows world. I usually use _ or - as delimiters in file names, or use capital letters to break up names. If I think the file might have be used on the internet, I do not put spaces in the file names.

Save as an industry standard type - Think about your audience and save in a format that they will be able to use. (e.g. If everyone is using Microsoft Word, you might wish to save in that format, regardless of your personal feelings towards Microsoft. (recognizing that it is a proprietary type, not industry standard). Or choices such as RTF will open automatically with whichever application has been selected as the default by the user.)

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