🚀 go-pugleaf

For those interested, there is a utility available from CrossCourt Systems
which claims (and appears) to be an improved WP5.x->text translator.  A short
summary from the docs:

===================
       TextOut/5 converts WordPerfect 5.0 and 5.1 document files on IBM-
       compatible computers to ASCII.  It improves upon WordPerfect's Text
       Out command, in both the "DOS Text" and "generic" formats.

       1.  TextOut/5 translates text, captions, and equations from graphics
           boxes, as well as footnotes and endnotes; WordPerfect does not.
       2.  TextOut/5 formats tables much better than WordPerfect does.
       3.  TextOut/5 translates over 400 of WordPerfect's special characters
           to ASCII; WordPerfect translates only 150.
       4.  TextOut/5 allows you to specify the line length you want in the
           ASCII file, without any reformatting on your part.
       5.  TextOut/5 can use special characters to mark many font attributes,
           such as underline, allowing you to transfer the file to another
           word processor and restore the attributes.
       6.  TextOut/5 runs from the DOS command line, and accepts wildcard
           filespecs.  [Hmmm...good for 500 files???! -DL]
       7.  TextOut/5 can recover text from damaged files that WordPerfect
           will not load.

===================

Their address and phone are
       CrossCourt Systems
       1521 Greenview Ave.
       East Lansing, MI 48823
       (517) 332-4353
according to the same doc file.

This utility is available also on Simtel20 as PD1:<MSDOS.TXTUTL>TXTOUT13.ARC
and probably several other places (wuarchive.wustl.edu???).

Btw, I have no relationship with CrossCourt Systems whatsoever (except as
one who has retrieved and tested one of their products and found it admirable).

Doug Lee  (dgl292@athenanet.com or uunet!pallas!dgl292)
(NOTE: that's "dgl" with a lower-case L, not #1)