Ventura Publisher

File Format
Name	Ventura Publisher
Ontology	Electronic File Formats Document Desktop Publishing Ventura Publisher
Extension(s)	.chp, .gen, .pub, .sty, .gem, .vp, others
PRONOM	x-fmt/156, x-fmt/57
Type Code	VCHP
Wikidata ID	Q1132555
Released	1986

Ventura Publisher was a desktop publication software package original built on the GEM VDI Metafile system by Digital Research. Distributed by Xerox until bought by Corel in 1993.

File Identification

Ventura Publisher versions 2-5 save its documents to the .CHP (Chapters) format, but also uses the following components:

Document File	Extension	PRONOM	Notes
Captions	CAP
Chapters	CHP		Points to Text and Graphics
Chapter information	CIF
Frame tags file	FRM
Generated text	GEN	x-fmt/156
Graphics	VGR		Created when graphics are created within Ventura
HPGL converter settings	PRF
OLE object file	VPO
Publications	PUB		Groups Chapter files into Publication
Style sheets	STY
Width tables	WID
GEM Line-art	GEM	fmt/542	Generated when other formats are imported
GEM Image	IMG	x-fmt/159	Generated when other formats are imported

Version 5 was redeveloped for Windows and included OLE support. Therefore .CHP, .STY, and .PUB formats changed to OLE containers.

Versions 7-10 use a single .VP file to store the full publication including stylesheets and chapters. .VP is based on the Microsoft Compound File format.

Corel VENTURA versions 3 to 5 save stylesheets externally with the filename extension STY. Versions later than version 5 save the stylesheet as part of the publication file. If you are importing tags from version 3 to version 5 publications, open the stylesheet file. If you are importing tags from a version later than version 5, open the publication file. Frame tags in versions 4 and 5 publications are stored in a chapter file with the filename extension CHP.

Software

• Corel Ventura 7 Demo
• DOS program to fix CHP files to updated paths

Links

• Wikipedia: Corel Ventura
• Ventura Publisher 1.1 Reference 1987