I load in Inkscape complex SVG docs produced by another program.
Documents contain <path> elems without explicit fill:none and Inkscape renders them with black filling.
How can I configure Inkscape to load docs and render them by default without filling?

I found around several answers on how to teach Inkscape to draw elements without filling as default, but they do not apply to my case.
Each time I load a new file, its paths are filled in black regardless.

I am new to Inkscape, so I need a simple, patient answer. Thank you in advance.

Hi.

That sounds your svg file doesn't have "fill:none", but no fills set at all.
As, in the fill and stroke panel (Shift+Ctrl+F) you can set fill "unset", that will be rendered as black -icon on the far right-. (Useful feature when you clone objects, by the way.)

So a quick solution would be selecting all the objects (Ctrl+A), and setting no fill by that mentioned panel.

http://tavmjong.free.fr/INKSCAPE/MANUAL/html/Attributes-Fill-Stroke.html