How Annotations in tiff images work, between different versions of Windows and Office

 

How Annotations in tiff images work, between different versions of Windows and Office

Recently, someone had difficulties with the annotations you can create or edit in a tiff image. Until recently he was using the Windows 2000 "Kodak Imaging Tool" to create and edit tiff images. All his document processing corporate activities were based on these tiff images annotations, so he had gathered more than 200,000 tiff images in his database.

By migrating the Windows 2000 machines to either Windows XP or Windows Vista, he was facing problems viewing the previously created annotations on these tiff images. After investigation we reached these conclusions:

WINDOWS 2000

- Imaging preview works as expected. Annotations created and saved earlier, can now be viewed normally.

WINDOWS XP

- Windows Picture and Fax viewer works as expected. You can view/edit old annotations and create new ones.

- Microsoft Office 2003 Document and Imaging does not show the previously created annotations.

- Microsoft Office Picture Manager 2003 tool does not show the annotations.

WINDOWS VISTA

- Windows photo gallery does not show the annotations.

- Windows Live photo gallery does not show the annotations.

- Microsoft Office 2007 Document and Imaging does not show the annotations.

- Microsoft Office Picture Manager 2007 tool does not show the annotations.

So under these circumstances, a workaround is to

- Use Office 2003 Document Scanning Tool to scan the documents into tiff images.

- Then open them with Office 2003 Document & Imaging Tool to add new annotations or view/edit the existing ones.

Published Thursday, March 26, 2009 1:38 PM by John Daskalakis

Action plans and problem solving : How Annotations in tiff images work, between different versions of Windows and Office