The Multi-Boot Configuration Handbook

Platform-Specific File Formats

Fortunately, truly platform-specific file formats are rare, although in practice, limitations on imports and exports might make platform-limited formats little better than platform-specific formats. For example, the component applications of Microsoft Office are available only on Windows (on x86 hardware; there is a Macintosh version of Office). Because file imports and exports are invariably imperfect, using a non-Microsoft program to create Microsoft Office files is a suboptimal solution at best. Transferring files back and forth through import/export filters several times often adds to the problems on each transfer. Therefore, if your goal is to use two OSs to work with a file in an arbitrary manner, you should ...