Raj, Well-worded. Like it or not, and trust me I hate it, Microsoft Word is a standard. For what it is worth, I receive .lwp documents from IBM all the time. I can't open them up in OpenOffice and I can't open them up in Microsoft Word. After research, I realized that lwp is for Lotus Word Pro. They ended up reconverting it into a PDF format for me.
Conversion/Compatibility are the key and, in time, the standard may very well change again, preferably to an open-doc format. JMF > -----Original Message----- > From: Periyasamy, Raj [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > Sent: Thursday, December 12, 2002 2:54 PM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: RE: Decent Word / Excel Conversion: Not yet? > > > 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 > -- redhat-list mailing list unsubscribe mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?subject=unsubscribe https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/redhat-list
