Compound document - Definition and Overview

In computing, a compound document is a document type typically produced using word processing software, and is a regular text document intermingled with e.g. spreadsheets, pictures, digital videos, digital audio, and other multimedia features. It can also be used to collect several documents into one.

Compound document technologies is commonly utilized on top of a software componentry framework, but the idea of software componentry includes several other concepts apart from compound documents, and software components alone does not enable compound documents. Well-known technologies for compound documents include:

• Object linking and embedding (OLE) by Microsoft
• Bonobo by Ximian (primarily used by GNOME)
• KParts in KDE
• Open Document Architecture from ITU-T (not used)
• OpenDoc by Apple Computer (now defunct)
• XML and XSL are encapsulation formats used for compound documents of all kinds

See also: transclusion