[wplug] Re: MISM mentor program

[Bill]

Alex

As far as you know, is there anything 'unusual' in this word doc?  My
OpenOffice has never-ever crashed when opening any M$ documents.  

I know I've successfully opened 97, 2000 and XP docs.  


On Sun, 2003-02-09 at 22:08, Alexandros Papadopoulos wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
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> On Sunday 09 February 2003 19:47, you wrote:
> > Hi Alex
> >
> > Thanks for registering. Please complete the attached MENTEE
> > APPLICATION FORM and send it back to the following email address by
> > Friday, Feb 14th
> <snip>
> > Content-Type: application/msword; name="MISM Mentee Form.doc"
> > Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
> 
> I'm sorry, but I was unable to read the Microsoft Word document you sent 
> me. Microsoft has been steadily changing the .doc format over the 
> releases of Microsoft Word (4.0, 95, 97, 2000, and now XP). Microsoft 
> has also intentionally refused to release the specification of the .doc 
> format to the community, making Microsoft Word the only application 
> that can reliably open this format. There is the freeware Microsoft 
> Word Viewer application, but it only runs on Microsoft Windows 
> operating systems and does not allow one to edit the document.
> 
> The development team that designed the software I choose to use 
> (OpenOffice.org), has tried hard to figure out how the .doc format is 
> created and interpreted, in order to make it available to more people. 
> They believe that all people should be able to exchange information 
> electronically, and .doc is one of the most common formats. So, they 
> tried to make OpenOffice.org, the only competitor to Microsoft's own 
> Office suite, as compatible as possible with Microsoft's own formats. 
> But Microsoft did not like this, because it would mean that people that 
> have not bought Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office would be able to 
> read and write .doc documents.
> 
> Unfortunately, it seems that Microsoft is sometimes successful. My 
> non-Microsoft application was unable to open the .doc document you sent 
> me. As a result, we cannot exchange information, until one of the 
> following happens:
> 
> [0] The information intented to be read/processed by me is converted to 
> an open format that people who have not purchased Microsoft Windows and 
> Microsoft Office are able to process.
> 
> [1] I purchase and install Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Word, and by 
> deduction all other Microsoft applications necessary to do my work.
> 
> Because it will be a cold day in hell before I do the latter, I would 
> suggest we find a different way of exchanging information 
> electronically.
> 
> - -A
> 
> PS: I hope you realize that I have nothing against you as a person. I 
> just can't use the document you sent me, and I tried to explain why the 
> implicit assumption that I would be able to read it, was mistaken.
> 
> PPS: When I tried to open the document you sent to me, my word processor 
> crashed, obviously unable to properly interpret the .doc format. My 
> word processor was handling 4 other documents at the time. Two of them 
> were assignments, and all changes I had not saved were lost. On 
> aggregate, about two hours of my work were lost because the 
> OpenOffice.org developers were not good enough to overcome the barriers 
> that Microsoft put in place, and render the document properly. I 
> believe they are the last to blame for this failure.
> 
> PPPS: For further reasons why .doc should not be the format of choice 
> when exchanging information electronically, I invite you to read 
> http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html
> It may be long, but it certainly exposes the compromises both you, as 
> the sender, and I, as the receiver, are making by exchanging Microsoft 
> Word documents.
> - -- 
> http://andrew.cmu.edu/~apapadop/pub_key.asc
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