Corel to Integrate Office With Word Perfect Lightning

Corel said Tuesday that it had created a new module for its WordPerfect Lightning product that would allow users to import the information they have collected into Microsoft Office, and vice versa.

Lightning was first introduced in February as a free compact version of its regular word processing product and is only 16MB in total size.

The program is made up of four modules: Navigator, which helps users assemble and organize their content; Viewer, which can open documents in Word, PDF, and WordPerfect; and Lightning Notes, which is a small word processing and note-taking utility.

Now with the new functionality, users would be able to aggregate information from Word documents (as well as WordPerfect, PDF, images, and Web content) into Lightning Notes, and would be able to export to the Microsoft format directly. The company is marketing it as an inexpensive alternative to Word for simple word processing.

"Adapting WordPerfect Lightning to work with Microsoft Office is an important development for Corel and for the millions of Microsoft Office users worldwide who can now benefit from WordPerfect Lightning within their existing workflows," Corel graphics and productivity head Nick Davies said.

Those who download WordPerfect Lightning starting Tuesday would receive the module as part of the download. It comes with a 30-day trial, although those who plan to use it after that period would have to pay $49 to register it.