title: Character encoding of Microsoft Word DOC and DOCX files?
body: <p>I'm not too familiar with the encoding that Microsoft Word uses. If someone where to save a .doc or .docx file from Word, what is the standard encoding that is used?</p>
  
  <p>I'm guessing it's not UTF-8 as the resulting text (pasted in a UTF-8 encoded text file) does not honour certain punctuation (e.g quotes).</p>
  
  <p>For example, an opening Word 'smart quote' when pasted in a UTF-8 text file, results in an <code>ì</code> symbol. If Word does indeed encode in UTF-8, then how does Word attempt to render the actual <a href="http://www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/char/00ed/index.htm">UTF-8 character</a>?</p>
  
  <p><strong>Edit</strong></p>
  
  <p>After doing a little digging, I can see that a Microsoft Word .docx file is actually a compressed format. Unzipping it results in a number of .xml files to be unpacked.</p>
  
  <p>However, the inability for a UTF-8 encoded text file to honour these 'smart' quotes is still perplexing. Any enlightening information would be helpful.</p>