Why can't Battery open recent .nki?

A thread called "opening .nki files in B3.0.3 " was summarily closed, which I find disappointing as its subject remains relevant and the current Battery document is dishonest on the subject. Battery docs say that Battery opens nki files, but, actually, Battery doesn't open any nki that I have created. Why has NI removed this functionality? Is there a practical workaround?

 

It is probably that Battery can't open NKI's that are newer than the version of Kontakt at the time of the last major revision of Battery. The NKI (Kontakt) format is constantly being updated, so older programs can't keep up with it.

 

Weird! NTTFM. Battery's File Open dialogue does not support nki at all. Testing your hypothesis by drag'n'drop instead, the oldest nki that I happen to have around is from 2002 (so presumably created by Kontakt <before numbering was invented>). That opens in Battery 3.0.6. A recent nki (for me, that means created in K 3.5) causes Battery to flash its GUI as if it's loading it, but nothing is loaded. So your hypothesis is likely correct. However, the lack of any support for nki in the file dialogue suggests that NI is deprecating support for nki in Battery. That seems a shame, because it's useful to be able to go back and forwards between the two, IMHO. Anyway, thanks for your help.