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Unable to read contents of .doc file in iOS

I am trying to read in arabic text that I have contained inside of a .doc file, and use it in my app. Unfortunately, the only way I am able to retrieve the text is if I convert the document into .txt file.

Here is the code I have:

NSError *error = nil;
NSString *path = @"MyArabicDocument";
NSString *root = [[NSBundle mainBundle]pathForResource:path ofType:@"doc"];
NSString *myFile = [NSString stringWithContentsOfFile:root encoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding error:&error];

NSLog(@"my file contents are: %@", myFile);
NSLog(@"error is: %@", error);

The output of my NSString object is (null), and the error I get is: 

error is: Error Domain=NSCocoaErrorDomain Code=256 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (Cocoa error 256.)" UserInfo=0x7aace470 {NSFilePath=/Users/MyName/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator/Devices/.../data/Containers/Bundle/Application/..MyApp.app/MyArabicDocument.doc}

If I convert my document into an .rtf format, then my output (after changing the extension in the above block of code) is the following:

my file contents are: {\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\cocoartf1347\cocoasubrtf570
{\fonttbl\f0\fnil\fcharset0 LucidaGrande;\f1\fnil\fcharset178 AlBayan;\f2\fnil\fcharset178 GeezaPro;
}
{\colortbl;\red255\green255\blue255;}
\vieww10800\viewh8400\viewkind0
\deftab709
\pard\pardeftab709\pardirnatural

\f0\fs46 \cf0 1
\f1  - \'de\'f3\'dc\'c7\'e1\'f3 \'c7\'c8\'fa\'dc\'e4\'f5 \'c2\'c8\'f3\'f8 \'e6\'f3\'c7\'d3\'fa\'e3\'f5\'dc\'e5\'f5 \'e3\'f5\'cd\'f3\'e3\'f3\'f8\'dc\'cf\'f5
\f0 ~~~
\f1 \'c7\'e1\'e1\'e5\'f3 \'dd\'f6\'dc\'ed \'df\'f5\'dc\'e1\'f6\'f8 \'c7\'e1\'c3\'f5\'e3\'f5\'dc\'e6\'d1\'f6 \'c3\'f3\'cd\'fa\'dc\'e3\'f3\'dc\'cf\'f5 \

...

If I try to use an NSAttributedString object instead of an NSString object, but I still get a (null) value for my NSAttributedString object:

NSDictionary *attrs = @{NSDocumentTypeDocumentAttribute: NSRTFTextDocumentType, NSWritingDirectionAttributeName:@[@(NSWritingDirectionRightToLeft | NSTextWritingDirectionOverride)]};

NSAttributedString *text = [[NSAttributedString alloc] initWithFileURL:[[NSBundle mainBundle] URLForResource:@"MyArabicDocument" withExtension:@"doc"] options:attrs documentAttributes:nil error:&error];

The reason why this is important is that while my arabic text does indeed appear in my UITextView in my app, the problem is that it's appearance is nowhere near as nice as in the original document, which is what I would like to maintain in my app. Is this not possible?

Solution

  • .doc file in question is in binary format. (probably compressed like .docx)

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doc_(computing)

    So you cannot put it in NSString as is. But you can get NSData:

    NSString *path = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"MyArabicDocument" ofType:@"doc"];
NSData *data = [NSData dataWithContentsOfFile:path];

    Unfortunately you cannot make an NSAttributedString from .doc in iOS, but you can in OS X (in iOS there only four doc types supported)

    NSError *attrError;
NSDictionary *options = @{NSDocumentTypeDocumentAttribute: NSDocFormatTextDocumentType};
NSAttributedString *content = [[NSAttributedString alloc] initWithData:data options:options documentAttributes:nil error:&attrError];

    Instead you may try to load your .doc file into WebView.

    Using NSData:

    [self.webView loadData:data MIMEType:@"application/msword" textEncodingName:@"UTF-8" baseURL:nil];

    But I think better with NSURLRequest (since you don't nee to set up encoding there)

    NSURL *url = [NSURL fileURLWithPath:path];
NSURLRequest *request = [NSURLRequest requestWithURL:url];
[webView loadRequest:request];

    NOTE: Any method you choose very likely will BREAK your format, I mean rendered document will be corrupted. Instead I recommend to convert .doc to .pdf In this case it will be good-loking.

    For example Dropbox app for iOS defenetly converts .doc/.docx to pdf and than presented to the user as PDF (Of course not telling that it is PDF indeed).