Today we’ve released the final version of the Open XML File Format Converter for Mac, now available for download from the Microsoft Download Center :

Open XML File Format Converter for Mac package

To enable seamless read/write of Open XML documents within Office 2004 applications, you’ll need that and you will also need:

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac 11.5.0 Update 

which is available by download or automatically through Microsoft AutoUpdate (for Office 2004). Combined, these updates allow Office 2004 to work seamlessly with the new .docx, .pptx and .xlsx document types.

The Converter application can still be used as a stand-alone converter, for example to perform batch conversion, but with the 11.5 update installed you won’t need to launch the Converter at all, as the new file formats will simply work – documents will open and you will also find the new format options available in the “Save As” dialogs in Word, PowerPoint and Excel.

There’s more goodness – to promote better compatibility with documents created with newer versions of Office, installing the Converter will also install six new fonts for use with Office 2004, if the latter is present on your computer. These are the new Office ‘C’ fonts – Cambria, Constantia, and peers – some more info here. (I’ve grown “fond” of Calibri myself.)

Note that the 11.5 update does not bring all of the major new features in Office 2008 back to Office 2004, such as the new OfficeArt engine and SmartArt, or the new larger spreadsheet dimensions, new formula capabilities and so forth. The converter will alert and translate new features as best it can, for example converting SmartArt to a picture, but some new features can be lost, so for documents which use these new features heavily you should use Office 2004 for viewing rather than editing the master copy of such a document.

For the details on compatibility and usage, please consult this Knowledge Base (KB) article.

We’re very pleased to get this major release out as a free update for our Office 2004 customers, to ensure smooth compatibility with newer Open XML-based documents. With this release our extensive effort to transition the Mac product line to Open XML support is complete, though the practical applications and possibilities of open, standardized, XML-based document formats for Office are hopefully just beginning. If you’d like to read more about this transition or about the Open XML format, I suggest the Open XML Community site.

If you are an Office 2004 user, please give this download a whirl and let us know how it works for you. (I promise to resist the urge to sell you on all the wicked nice improvements you’d get with a full upgrade to Office 2008 – we can leave that for another occasion.)