Google Docs Now Offers .xlsx and .docx File Formats

Google has added .docx and .xlsx to the list of file formats it accepts for uploading on Google Docs, its cloud-based application that stores a user’s documents in the cloud.

Google Docs already accepts documents in .doc, .odt, .xls, .ods, .ppt, .csv, .html, .txt and .rtf formats, among others.

In order to import a .docx or .xlsx file, users can simply click the "Upload" button on the Docs List menu, select the file, and let the application upload and convert the document for Google Docs. Those users seeking to upload multiple documents simultaneously can utilize the Google Documents List API.

Google also unveiled two new Data APIs for spreadsheets at the Google I/O Developer conference on May 27-28.

"The two new Data APIs, the Tables and Records feeds, provide a structured record-based table for storing and updating tabular data in a spreadsheet," Radhika Lakshmanan, software engineer with Google, wrote in a June 1 corporate blog posting. "Tables can be placed anywhere on the sheet, with multiple tables per sheet and column-based meta-data for each column in the table."

The Records feed "is a feed of rows within a table, which we are calling records, with stable IDs," Lakshmanan added. "The APIs allow for creating, reading, updating and deleting records and tables in a spreadsheet."

These APIs allow spreadsheets to be more dynamically updated and managed, useful for small to medium-sized businesses with an online storefront. The Records feed allows for communication between that online store and the spreadsheet, for continuous updating of inventory and records.