Microsoft's Rich Text Format started out as an vendor-neutral format for word processors to exchange styled documents. The canonical location for the specification is somewhere at msdn.microsoft.com. However, that site is rather poorly laid out, difficult to browse. The site structure also makes it impossible to find a version of the RTF specification without resorting to a search.
The most relevant link that MSDN search turns up is the RTF 1.6 spec, which seems to exist only in web form, not a single-file document (RTF, Doc, PDF, ZIP, EXE or otherwise). However, the most up-to-date version appears to be RTF 1.7 (a ZIP file masquerading as a Windows executable).
A PDF for RTF 1.5 exists somewhere on the net, and it tracks changes through Word 97. RTF 1.6 adds compatibility information for Word 2000, and RTF 1.7 adds compatibility information for Word 2002. Presumably there's an RTF 1.8 in the works that will be out shortly after the release of Office 11...
(Funny how a "vendor neutral interchange format" tracks releases of Word so faithfully...)
I think I'll email MSDN and ask them why 1) this is a
(Funny how a "vendor neutral interchange format" tracks releases of Word so faithfully...)
...and always 1-to-1 reiterates the MSWord's feature set! and offers no (official) way to express things outside of that feature set, like overstrikes or center-page-vertically, just to name some random WordPerfect features not in MSWord.
Have I mentioned I'm writing a little pocket-ref book about RTF? I'm just finishing it up now, in fact.
