SXW Format Guide
SXW — StarOffice/OpenOffice.org Writer, the legacy OpenDocument word processing format
About SXW Format
SXW (StarOffice Writer) is a legacy word processing document format originally developed by Sun Microsystems for StarOffice and later adopted by OpenOffice.org. Introduced in 2002 with StarOffice 6.0 and OpenOffice.org 1.0, SXW was the predecessor to the modern ODT (OpenDocument Text) format standardized as ODF 1.0 in 2005.
SXW files are ZIP archives containing XML files (content.xml, styles.xml, meta.xml) that describe the document structure, formatting, and metadata. This architecture was carried forward into the ODF standard. As a source format for conversion, SXW documents can be read by Pandoc (using its ODT reader) and modern office suites like LibreOffice and Apache OpenOffice.
Advantages
- Open format — no vendor lock-in, XML-based structure
- Rich text formatting — headings, tables, lists, images, styles
- Compatible with ODT readers — LibreOffice, OpenOffice, Pandoc
- Structured content — well-organized XML allows reliable parsing
- Cross-platform — supported on Windows, macOS, and Linux
- Predecessor to ODF standard — established open document conventions
Disadvantages
- Legacy format — superseded by ODT (ODF 1.0) in 2005
- Limited modern support — newer applications may not recognize SXW
- No active development — format specification is frozen
- Microsoft Office compatibility issues — not natively supported
- Smaller user base than ODT or DOCX
Available Conversions
Convert SXW to AsciiDoc format
Convert SXW to AsciiDoc markup
Convert SXW to Kindle e-book
Encode SXW document in Base64
Convert SXW to BBCode markup
Export SXW content to CSV
Convert SXW to Word DOC
Convert SXW to DocBook XML
Convert SXW to Word OOXML
Convert SXW to EPUB e-book
Convert SXW to EPUB3 e-book
Convert SXW to FictionBook
Encode SXW in hexadecimal
Convert SXW to HTML page
Convert SXW text to INI format
Convert SXW to JSON structure
Convert SXW to LaTeX source
Export SXW text as log file
Convert SXW to Markdown
Convert SXW to MD format
Convert SXW to MediaWiki markup
Convert SXW to Mobipocket e-book
Upgrade SXW to modern ODT
Convert SXW to Org-mode
Convert SXW to PDF document
Convert SXW to PowerPoint
Convert SXW to Java Properties
Convert SXW to reStructuredText
Convert SXW to Rich Text Format
Generate SQL from SXW content
Convert SXW to SVG format
Convert SXW to TeX source
Extract SXW to plain text
Convert SXW to Textile markup
Convert SXW to TOML format
Export SXW to tab-separated values
Extract SXW to plain text file
Convert SXW to Wiki markup
Export SXW to Excel spreadsheet
Convert SXW to structured XML
Convert SXW to YAML format
Convert SXW to YML format