You are contradicting your own statement. Just because you want to use a particular format, does not mean every one should change over to that format. The solution is compatibility and conversion tools. Every document format has its own advantages and disadvantages. Hence, you can not expect people to stop using proprietary formats if such formats have proven to become a widely accepted standard. When Microsoft Word was introduced, still people were using Word Perfect as standard for word processing. However, Word had its own document format, at the same time you could open WordPerfect documents under Word or save Word documents as WordPerfect files. Ultimately Word document format became a standard. Compatibility is the key word. If any new product whether Open source or not needs to compete with existing products, the compatibility and conversion has to be a very important future. Without which many "not so computer literate" users wont even think of changing over to an Open source application. Again, I am not saying Word format is the way to go. COMPATIBILITY is what I mean. FYI, I am using Open Office suite with RH 8.0 on my home PC.
Regards, -----Original Message----- From: gabriel [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Thursday, December 12, 2002 2:22 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Decent Word / Excel Conversion: Not yet? On December 12, 2002 11:30 am, Ed Wilts wrote: > We need good conversion tools, that's all there is to it. We need to > play in their world, not assume world domination by making them > change. it may sound naive, but it's not. how else can we expect people to stop using proprietary formats? wait for microsoft to adopt standars? no. social change is the only way, and it starts with people like us. if we recieve a proprietary formatted file, open it in windows and re-save as an rtf or something... BUT then send them an email with a brief explanation as to why (and more importantly how) they should save documents they intend to distribute in open formats. it doesn't have to be technobabble, just something simple like: "i got your file, but it took me 20minutes to open it since micros~1 has refused to adopt a standardised system. if you're going to send me files, please use a more universal format." even my grandmother would understand that, and with simple instructions, she'll send me a text file next time. -- corporation, n. an ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - ambrose bierce -- redhat-list mailing list unsubscribe mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?subject=unsubscribe https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/redhat-list -- redhat-list mailing list unsubscribe mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?subject=unsubscribe https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/redhat-list
