Rich Text Format - Common Uses and Interoperability

Common Uses and Interoperability

Most word processing software implementations support RTF format importing and exporting (following some version of RTF specification), and/or direct editing, often making it a "common" format between otherwise incompatible word processing software and operating systems. These factors contribute to its interoperability, but it will depend on what version of RTF is being used. There are several consciously designed or accidentally born RTF dialects. Most applications which read RTF files silently ignore unknown RTF control words.

RTF is the internal markup language used by Microsoft Word. Overall, since 1987, RTF files may be transferred back and forth between many old and new computer systems (and now over the Internet) despite differences between operating systems and their versions. (But there are some compatibility problems, e.g. between RTF 1.0 1987 and later specifications, or between RTF 1.0-1.4 and RTF 1.5+ in use of Unicode characters.) This makes it a useful format for basic formatted text documents such as instruction manuals, résumés, letters, and modest information documents. These documents at minimum support bold, italic, and underline text formatting. Also typically supported are left-, center-, and right-aligned text. Also, font specification and document margins are supported in RTF documents.

Font and margin defaults, as well as style presets and other functions will vary according to program defaults. There may also be subtle differences perhaps between different versions of the RTF specification implemented in differing programs and program versions. Nevertheless, the RTF format is consistent enough from computer to computer to be considered highly portable and acceptable for cross-platform use. The format supports metadata such as title, author, etc. but not all implementations support this.