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Porting
Files Across Platforms:
Overview |
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I've had several requests for cross-platform tutorials.
This is the first in a series of tutorials for sharing
files between Macintosh® and
Windows® systems. There is
good news for porting files between Mac®
and PC and that is that most all graphic file formats
will port without any modification whatsoever. You can
share files between Mac and PC versions of Adobe®
Illustrator®, Adobe Photoshop®,
Macromedia® FreeHand®,
CorelDRAW® and Deneba Canvas™
to name a few.
Some File Types That Port Easily Between Mac and
Windows
You can share files from practically any
application that is supported on both platforms. Although
I am unable to do a proper test of all file formats
in all systems, I have a Mac-Win network with a G4 Power
Mac running OS 9 and a PC running Windows 98. On this
system I've been able to successfully port the following
formats without any problems:
| File Type |
Application |
Note |
PSD
AI
EPS
PDF
FH8 / FH9
CNV
PICT
GIF
JPG
PNG
TXT
DOC
HTM / HTML
FDB / ADM
QXD
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Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator
Generic EPS
Adobe Acrobat®
Macromedia FreeHand
Deneba Canvas
Macintosh PICT
GIF image
JPEG image
Macromedia Fireworks®
Notepad or SimpleText
Microsoft® Word®
Web pages
Extensis® Portfolio™
QuarkXPress™ |
Use .PCT extension on PC |
Please keep in mind that this is a very
limited list. There are many more formats which will
port just as well.
You can even download files from the Internet
intended for one platform using the other platform to
download them. For example, it is common to download
files in compressed format. You can download PC files
such as .ZIP and .EXE using a Mac and port them over
to the PC. These are WinZip, PKZIP (.ZIP) or EXEcutable
(program) files on the PC. You also can download Macintosh
.SIT and .BIN files with the PC and port them over to
the Mac. These are Stuffit (.SIT) and MacBinary (.BIN)
file compression formats used on the Mac (more
here on these file formats).
The Macintosh and PC File Systems
The main difference between the Mac and
PC file systems is that some Macintosh files have two
parts called "forks" - a data fork and a resource
fork. PC files have only one part. When files are ported
from the Mac to the PC, the PC recognizes the data fork,
but can't really do anything with the resource fork.
Fortunately, most graphic file formats use the data
fork.
Porting Icons and Fonts Between Mac and PC
While most application data files port
without a hitch, icons and fonts are a different story.
Mac icons and fonts are stored as resources. Fonts require
special software and techniques for them to survive
the trip (more about porting fonts here).
Icons are basically images and can be converted into
one of the bitmap formats then ported as data, then
recreated into icons once ported. There is a lot more
to the subject than can be adequately covered on this
page, so it is only mentioned here.
Click
Here To Continue...
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