Generating Browser-Compatible HTML from Aspose.Words DOCX Conversion

Aspose.Words Product Family
1

Hi
Greetings,

I’m currently using Aspose.Words for Java to convert DOCX files into HTML. My use case involves loading the generated HTML into a rich text editor (like TinyMCE or CKEditor), allowing users to edit the content and later re-convert it back to DOCX.

While Aspose’s HtmlSaveOptions works well for preserving fidelity, the resulting HTML contains a number of Aspose-specific attributes and styles (e.g., -aw-*, inline CSS for lists, etc.) that rich text editors either sanitize or fail to interpret correctly. For example:

  • Lists often render visually but lose structure (<p> instead of <ul><li>).
  • SDTs (content controls) appear with Aspose-specific styles instead of generic attributes.
  • Complex tables sometimes rely on nonstandard inline styles that are stripped in browsers or editors.

My goal:
To generate HTML that:

  1. Renders accurately and semantically in browsers and RTEs (using standard HTML/CSS tags).
  2. Avoids Aspose-specific markup while retaining enough information to reconstruct the DOCX when needed.

Could you please advise:

  • Whether Aspose.Words provides a “generic” or “browser-optimized” HTML export mode suitable for such use cases?
  • Any recommended settings, save options, or best practices to produce editor-friendly HTML while preserving DOCX structure?

Thanks for your time and guidance.

Best regards,
Soumya

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@SoumyaG12

Hello Soumya,

To generate browser-compatible HTML from DOCX files using Aspose.Words for Java, you can utilize the HtmlSaveOptions class. However, please note that there are no specific “generic” or “browser-optimized” HTML export modes that completely eliminate Aspose-specific attributes and styles.

Here are some recommendations to help you produce more editor-friendly HTML:

  1. Use HtmlSaveOptions: Set the ExportHeadersFootersMode to ExportHeadersFootersMode.None to exclude headers and footers from the output. Additionally, set ExportListLabels to ExportListLabels.AsInlineText to simplify list structures.

    HtmlSaveOptions options = new HtmlSaveOptions();
options.setExportHeadersFootersMode(ExportHeadersFootersMode.None);
options.setExportListLabels(ExportListLabels.AsInlineText);

  2. Post-Processing: After generating the HTML, consider implementing a post-processing step to clean up Aspose-specific attributes and styles. You can use a library like Jsoup to parse and manipulate the HTML, ensuring it adheres to standard HTML/CSS practices.

  3. Testing in RTEs: Test the generated HTML in your rich text editor (such as TinyMCE or CKEditor) to identify any rendering issues. Adjust your HTML generation settings based on the feedback from these tests.

  4. Manual Adjustments: For complex tables and lists, you may need to manually adjust the HTML structure after conversion to ensure compatibility with the editors.

By following these steps, you should be able to create HTML that is more compatible with rich text editors while retaining the necessary structure for re-conversion to DOCX.

Best regards!

3

@SoumyaG12 Please note, Aspose.Words Document Object Model is designed to work with MS Word documents. HTML documents object model is quite different and it is not always possible to provide 100% fidelity after importing or exporting HTML document. Usually Aspose.Words mimics MS Word behavior when work with HTML documents.
Aspose.Words specific CSS attributes are used to preserve document roundtrip information to improve roundtrip conversion. You can disable this by setting HtmlSaveOptions.ExportRoundtripInformation property to false. In this case Aspose.Words will not write the roundtrip information with -aw-* CSS properties.