How to preserve all (or at least most) of the formatting and look'n'feel after importing a MS-Word document?

Question

I need to collaborate on a proposal (RFP) with my colleagues and our RFPs are in MS-Word format, with a lot of header, footer and other standard MS-Word formatting, and we would like to be able to see the document and then collaborate (edit) with multiple people working on the same document.

How can we do this in Confluence? Because after I import the MS-Word document, we lose most of the formatting and some other funny broken references show up poluting the document.

What is the best practice for working on a RFP document online using Confluence?

Also, keep in mind that after the RFP document is fully updated by all the parties we will need to export the contents in MS-Word format or PDF and the end result document should look the same as the contents in Confluence.

Btw, we use the webiste hosted by Atlassian, so we don't have your product in our premises and this is part of our evaluation of your product & services, so you timely response is appreciated.

Please, advise.

Thanks in advance!

Selcuk Savas1 · Answer

Hi,

I suggest you to test the macro on a windows computer with IE to see that do you get the desirable

results.

On the second article that I sent says that for Mac only Open Office 3.2.0 works.

You may need to install (at least for testing purposes) Open Office.

After I wrote my answer I found this question:

https://answers.atlassian.com/questions/104768/edit-in-office-in-confluence-doesn-t-work-for-mac-users

Unfortunately it is not a good news.

Further this point there may be some technical issues that you may need to request support from Atlassian.

Cheers,

Selcuk

Waldes Machado · Answer

Hi there,

I read the following articles you forward to me and they were VERY helpful, and I went a bit further and I found the following article related to this topic:

https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/CONF41/Installing+the+Firefox+Add-On+for+the+Office+Connector

but I have an issue when saving the MS-Word document after editing, the details are as follows.

Scenario: when I try to edit a MS-Word document stored inside a page in one of my spaces on Confluense, I am able to open the document and visualize it using the applicatino NeoOffice which is installed on my MacBook Pro, but after I make a couple of changes and I try to close the NeoOffice, then application NeoOffice asks if I want to save the document (obviously because of the changes made to the document).

Issue: when I select to save it with the changes, hoping it will be saved back to Confluence where the original document is stored and where the document actually comes from, but I get the following error:

"[!] Error saving the document RFQ1149LogiCoverLetter: General Error. General input/output error".

I followed the exact instructions but I am not sure why I have problems to save the document back to Confluence.

Environment: I am using the Confluence Ondemand (hosted by Atlassian) and I am using the Office Connector that comes with it. My machine is a Apple MacBook Pro running OS X (Lion), and I am using the web browser Firefox 15.0.1 for Mac and I do have the plug-in for WebDAV installed. I did not configure anything in the WebDAV, it was just installed automatically the first time I tried to open a MS-Word document and I did not change any configuration so far until now.

Please, can someone help by providing guidance on where the issue could be and how to fix this problem?

Thanks in advance!

Selcuk Savas1 · Answer

Hi,

Have you tried to use Office Word macro which allows you to embed the doc file on a Confluence page and edit using the MS Word?

Those article may help:

https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/CONF41/Displaying+Office+Files+in+Confluence

https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/CONF41/Editing+an+Office+Document+from+Confluence

Cheers,

Selcuk